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The Conquest 

The Story of a Negro Pioneer 



By THE PIONEER 



1913 

The Woodruff Press 

Lincoln, Nebr. 






Entered according to the Act of Congress in the year 1913, 

by the Woodruff Bank Note Co., in the office of the 

Librarian of Congress, at Washington, D. C. 




First Edition, May 1, 1913 



©CLA.3 47157 



To the 
HONORABLE BOOKER T. WASHINGTON 



\ 



INTRODUCTORY 

This is a true story of a negro who was dis- 
contented and the circumstances that were [the 
outcome of that discontent. -i- -:- -:- 



INDEX TO ILLUSTRATIONS 

Frontispiece PAGE ^ 

Became number one in the opening 56 ^ 

Everybody for miles around had journeyed thither to 

celebrate 113 ^ 

Made a declaration that he would build a town .... 128 V 

Although the valley could not be surpassed in the pro- 
duction of grain and alfalfa, the highlands on 
either side were great mountains of sand . . . . 133 ^ 

On the east the murky waters of the Missouri seek 

their level 140 v 

The real farmer was fast replacing the homesteader . . 145 V 

Everything grew so rank, thick and green 160 v 

Had put 280 acres under cultivation 177 > 

Bringing stock, household goods and plenty of money . . 192 v 

Were engaged in ranching and owned great herds in 

Tipp county 209 ^ 

As the people were all now riding in autos 241 v 

A beautiful townsite where trees stood 251 

Ernest Nicholson takes a hand 256 

The crops began to wither 289 

The cold days and long nights passed slowly by, and I 

cared for the stock 304 v 




The Conquest 

CHAPTER I 

DISCONTENT — SPIRIT OF THE PIONEER 

OOD gracious, has it been that long? 
It does not seem possible; but it was 
this very day nine years ago when a 
fellow handed me this little what- 
would-you-call-it, Ingalls called it "Opportunity." 
I've a notion to burn it, but I won't — not this time, 
instead, I'll put it down here and you may call it 
what you like. 

Master of human destinies am I. 

Fame, love, and fortune on my footsteps wait. 

Cities and fields I walk. I penetrate 

Deserts and seas remote, and passing by 

Hovel, and mart, and palace — soon or late 

I knock unbidden once at every gate. 

If sleeping, wake — if feasting, rise before 

I turn away. It is the hour of fate, 

And they who follow me reach every state 

Mortals desire, and conquer every foe 

Save death; but those who doubt or hesitate, 

Condemned to failure, penury, and woe 

Seek me in vain and uselessly implore, 

I answer not, and I return no more. 

Yes, it was that little poem that led me to this 
land and sometimes I wonder well, I just wonder, 

9 



10 The Conquest 

that's all. Again, I think it would be somewhat 
different if it wasn't for the wind. It blows and 
blows until it makes me feel lonesome and so far 
away from that little place and the country in 
southern Illinois. 

I was born twenty-nine years ago near the Ohio 
River, about forty miles above Cairo, the fourth son 
and fifth child of a family of thirteen, by the name 
of Devereaux — which, of course, is not my name 
but we will call it that for this sketch. It is a 
peculiar name that ends with an "eaux," however, 
and is considered an odd name for a colored man to 
have, unless he is from Louisiana where the French 
crossed with the Indians and slaves, causing many 
Louisiana negroes to have the French names and 
many speak the French language also. My father, 
however, came from Kentucky and inherited the 
name from his father who was sold off into Texas 
during the slavery period and is said to be living 
there today. 

He was a farmer and owned eighty acres of land 
and was, therefore, considered fairly "well-to-do," 
that is, for a colored man. The county in which 
we lived bordered on the river some twenty miles, 
and took its name from an old fort that used to do 
a little cannonading for the Federal forces back in 
the Civil War. 

The farming in this section was hindered by vari- 
ous disadvantages and at best was slow, hard work. 
Along the valleys of the numerous creeks and bay- 
ous that empty their waters into the Ohio, the soil 
was of a rich alluvium, where in the early Spring 
the back waters from the Ohio covered thousands 



The Conquest • 11 

of acres of farm and timber lands, and in receding 
left the land plastered with a coat of river sand and 
clay which greatly added to the soil's productivity. 
One who owned a farm on these bottoms was con- 
sidered quite fortunate. Here the corn stalks grew 
like saplings, with ears dangling one and two to a 
stalk, and as sound and heavy as green blocks of 
wood. 

The heavy rains washed the loam from the hills 
and deposited it on these bottoms. Years ago, 
when the rolling lands were cleared, and before the 
excessive rainfall had washed away the loose sur- 
face, the highlands were considered most valuable 
for agricultural purposes, equally as valuable as 
the bottoms now are. Farther back from the 
river the more rolling the land became, until some 
sixteen miles away it was known as the hills, and 
here, long before I was born, the land had been 
very valuable. Large barns and fine stately houses 
— now gone to wreck and deserted — stood behind 
beautiful groves of chestnut, locust and stately old 
oaks, where rabbits, quail and wood-peckers made 
their homes, and sometimes a raccoon or opposum 
founded its den during the cold, bleak winter days. 
The orchards, formerly the pride of their owners, 
now dropped their neglected fruit which rotted and 
mulched with the leaves. The fields, where formerly 
had grown great crops of wheat, corn, oats, timothy 
and clover, were now grown over and enmeshed 
in a tangled mass of weeds and dew-berry vines; 
while along the branches and where the old rail 
fences had stood, black-berry vines had grown up, 
twisting their thorny stems and forming a veritable 



12 TheConquest 

hedge fence. These places I promised mother to 
avoid as I begged her to allow me to follow the big 
boys and carry their game when they went hunting* 

In the neighborhood and throughout the country 
there had at one time been many colored farmers, 
or ex-slaves, who had settled there after the war. 
Many of them having built up nice homes and 
cleared the valley of tough-rooted hickory, gum, 
pecan and water-oak trees, and the highlands of the 
black, white, red or post oak, sassafras and dog- 
wood. They later grubbed the stumps and hauled 
the rocks into the roads, or dammed treacherous 
little streams that were continually breaking out 
and threatening the land with more ditches. But 
as time wore on and the older generation died, the 
younger were attracted to the towns and cities 
in quest of occupations that were more suitable to 
their increasing desires for society and good times. 
Leaving the farms to care for themselves until the 
inevitable German immigrant came along and 
bought them up at his own price, tilled the land, 
improved the farm and roads, straightened out the 
streams by digging canals, and grew prosperous. 

As for me, I was called the lazy member of the 
family; a shirker who complained that it was too 
cold to work in the winter, and too warm in the 
summer. About the only thing for which I was 
given credit was in learning readily. I always 
received good grades in my studies, but was con- 
tinually criticised for talking too much and being 
too inquisitive. We finally moved into the nearby 
town of M — pis. Not so much to get off the farm, 
or to be near more colored people (as most of the 



TheConquest 13 

younger negro farmers did) as to give the children 
better educational facilities. 

The local colored school was held in an old build- 
ing made of plain boards standing straight up and 
down with batten on the cracks. It was inadequate 
in many respects; the teachers very often ineffi- 
cient, and besides, it was far from home. After 
my oldest sister graduated she went away to teach, 
and about the same time my oldest brother quit 
school and went to a near-by town and became a x 
table waiter, much to the dissatisfaction of my 
mother, who always declared emphatically that she 
wanted none of her sons to become lackeys. 

When the Spanish-American War broke out 
the two brothers above me enlisted with a company 
of other patriotic young fellows and were taken to 
Springfield to go into camp. At Springfield their 
company was disbanded and those of the company 
that wished to go on were accepted into other 
companies, and those that desired to go home were 
permitted to do so. The younger of the two broth- 
ers returned home by freight; the other joined a 
Chicago company and was sent to Santiago and later 
to San Luis DeCuba, where he died with typhoid 
pneumonia. 

M — pis was an old town with a few factories, 
two flour mills, two or three saw mills, box factories 
and another concern where veneering was peeled 
from wood blocks softened with steam. The timber 
came from up the Tennessee River, which emptied 
into the Ohio a few miles up the river. There was 
also the market house, such as are to be seen in 
towns of the Southern states — and parts of the 



14 TheConquest 

Northern. This market house, or place, as it is 
often called, was an open building, except one end 
enclosed by a meat-market, and was about forty 
by one hundred feet with benches on either side 
and one through the center for the convenience of 
those who walked, carrying their produce in a 
home-made basket. Those in vehicles backed 
to a line guarded by the city marshall, forming an 
alleyway the width of the market house for perhaps 
half a block, depending on how many farmers were 
on hand. There was always a rush to get nearest 
the market house; a case of the early bird getting 
the worm. The towns people who came to buy, 
women mostly with baskets, would file leisurely 
between the rows of vehicles, hacks and spring 
wagons of various descriptions, looking here and 
there at the vegetables displayed. 

We moved back to the country after a time where 
my father complained of my poor service in the 
field and in disgust I was sent off to do the market- 
ing — which pleased me, for it was not only easy 
but gave me a chance to meet and talk with many 
people — and I always sold the goods and engaged 
more for the afternoon delivery. This was my first 
experience in real business and from that time ever 
afterward I could always do better business for 
myself than for anyone else. I was not given much 
credit for my ability to sell, however, until my 
brother, who complained that I was given all the 
easy work while he had to labor and do all the heav- 
ier farm work, was sent to do the marketing. He 
was not a salesman and lacked the aggressiveness 
to approach people with a basket, and never talked 



The Conquest 15 

much; was timid and when spoken to or approached 
plainly showed it. 

On the other hand, I met and became acquainted 
with people quite readily. I soon noticed that 
many people enjoy being flattered, and how pleased 
even the prosperous men's wives would seem if 
bowed to with a pleasant "Good Morning, Mrs. 
Quante, nice morning and would you care to look 
at some fresh roasting ears — ten cents a dozen; 
or some nice ripe strawberries, two boxes for fifteen 
cents ?" "Yes Maam, Thank you! and 0, 
Mrs. Quante, would you care for some radishes, 
cucumbers or lettuce for tomorrow? I could de- 
liver late this afternoon, you see, for maybe you 
haven't the time to come to market every day." 
From this association I soon learned to give to 
each and every prospective customer a different 
greeting or suggestion, which usually brought a 
smile and a nod of appreciation as well as a purchase. 

Before the debts swamped my father, and while 
my brothers were still at home, our truck gardening, 
the small herd of milkers and the chickens paid as 
well as the farm itself. About this time father 
fell heir to a part of the estate of a brother which 
came as a great relief to his ever increasing burden 
of debt. 

While this seeming relief to father was on I be- 
came very anxious to get away. In fact I didn't 
like M — pis nor its surroundings. It was a river 
town and gradually losing its usefulness by the 
invasion of railroads up and down the river; 
besides, the colored people were in the most part 
wretchedly poor, ignorant and envious. They were 



16 The Conquest 

set in the ways of their localisms, and it was quite 
useless to talk to them of anything that would 
better oneself. The social life centered in the two 
churches where praying, singing and shouting on 
v Sundays, to back-biting, stealing, fighting and get- 
ting drunk during the week was common among 
the men. They remained members in good stand- 
ing at the churches, however, as long as they paid 
their dues, contributed to the numerous rallies, or 
helped along in camp meetings and festivals. 
Others were regularly turned out, mostly for not 
paying their dues, only to warm up at the next 
revival on the mourners bench and come through 
converted and be again accepted into the church 
and, for awhile at least, live a near-righteous life. 
There were many good Christians in the church, 
however, who were patient with all this conduct, 
while there were and still are those who will not 
sanction such carrying-on by staying in a church 
that permits of such shamming and hypocrisy. 
These latter often left the church and were then 
branded either as infidels or human devils who had 
forsaken the house of God and were condemned 
to eternal damnation. 

My mother was a shouting Methodist and many 
times we children would slip quietly out of the 
church when she began to get happy. The old 
and less religious men hauled slop to feed a few 
pigs, cut cord- wood at fifty cents per cord, and 
did any odd jobs, or kept steady ones when such 
could be found. The women took in washing, 
cooked for the white folks, and fed the preachers. 
When we lived in the country we fed so many of 



The Conquest 17 

the Elders, with their long tailed coats and assuming 
and authoritative airs, that I grew to almost dislike u 
the sight of a colored man in a Prince Albert coat 
and clerical vest. At sixteen I was fairly disgusted 
with it all and took no pains to keep my disgust 
concealed. 

This didn't have the effect of burdening me with 
many friends in M — pis and I was regarded by many 
of the boys and girls, who led in the whirlpool of 
the local colored society, as being of the "too-slow- 
to-catch-cold" variety, and by some of the Elders 
as being worldly, a free thinker, and a dangerous 
associate for young Christian folks. Another thing 
that added to my unpopularity, perhaps, was my 
persistent declarations that there were not enough 
competent colored people to grasp the many op- 
portunities that presented themselves, and that 
if white people could possess such nice homes, 
wealth and luxuries, so in time, could the colored t 
people. "You're a fool", I would be told, and then 
would follow a lecture describing the time-worn 
long and cruel slavery, and after the emancipation, 
the prejudice and hatred of the white race, whose 
chief object was to prevent the progress and better- 
ment of the negro. This excuse for the negro's 
lack of ambition was constantly dinned into my / 
ears from the Kagle corner loafer to the minister 
in the pulpit, and I became so tired of it all that I 
declared that if I could ever leave M — pis I would 
never return. More, I would disprove such a _ 
theory and in the following chapters I hope to show 
that what I believed fourteen years ago was true. 




18 TheConquest 

CHAPTER II 

LEAVING HOME— A MAIDEN 

|WAS seventeen when I at last left M — pis. 
I accepted a rough job at a dollar and 
a quarter a day in a car manufacturing 
concern in a town of eight thousand 
population, about eight hundred being colored. 
I was unable to save very much, for work was dull 
that summer, and I was only averaging about 
four days' work a week. Besides, I had an attack 
of malaria at intervals for a period of two months, 
but by going to work at five o'clock A. M. when I 
was well I could get in two extra hours, making 
a dollar-fifty. The concern employed about twelve 
hundred men and paid their wages every two weeks, 
holding back one week's pay. I came there in 
June and it was some time in September that I 
drew my fullest pay envelope which contained six- 
teen dollars and fifty cents. 

About this time a "fire eating" colored evangelist, 
who apparently possessed great converting powers 
and unusual eloquence, came to town. These 
qualities, however, usually became very uninterest- 
ing toward the end of a stay. He had been to 
M — pis the year before I left and at that place his 
popularity greatly diminished before he left. The 
greater part of the colored people in this town were 
of the emotional kind and to these he was as at- 
tractive as he had been at M — pis in the beginning. 
Coincident with the commencement of Rev. 
Mclntyre's soul stirring sermons a big revival 



TheConquest 19 

was inaugurated, and although the little church 
was filled nightly to its capacity, the aisles were 
kept clear in order to give those that were " steeping 
in Hell's fire" (as the evangelist characterized those 
who were not members of some church) an open 
road to enter into the field of the righteous; also 
to give the mourners sufficient room in which to 
exhaust their emotions when the spirit struck 
them — and it is needless to say that they were used. 
At times they virtually converted the entire floor 
into an active gymnasium, regardless of the rights 
of other persons or of the chairs they occupied. 
I had seen and heard people shout at long intervals 
in church, but here, after a few soul stirring sermons, 
they began to run outside where there was more 
room to give vent to the hallucination and this 
wandering of the mind. It could be called nothing 
else, for after the first few sermons the evangelist 
would hardly be started before some mourner would 
begin to "come through." This revival warmed 
up to such proportions that preaching and shouting 
began in the afternoon instead of evening. Men 
working in the yards of the foundry two block away 
could hear the shouting above the roaring furnaces 
and the deafening noise of machinery of a great 
car manufacturing concern. The church stood on 
a corner where two streets, or avenues, intersected 
and for a block in either direction the influence of 
fanaticism became so intense that the converts 
began running about like wild creatures, tearing 
their hair and uttering prayers and supplications 
in discordant tones. 
At the evening services the sisters would "gather 



20 TheConquest 

around a mourner that showed signs of weakening 
and sing and babble until he or she became so be- 
fuddled they would jump up, throw their arms wildly 
into the air, kick, strike, then cry out like a dying 
soul, fall limp and exhausted into the many arms 
outstretched to catch them. This was always 
conclusive evidence of a contrite heart and a thor- 
oughly penitent soul. Far into the night this per- 
formance would continue, and when the mourners 7 
bench became empty the audience would be searched 
for sinners. I would sit through it all quite un- 

s emotional, and nightly I would be approached with 
"aren't you ready?" To which I would make no 
answer. I noticed that several boys, who were 
not in good standing with the parents of girls they 
wished to court, found the mourners' bench a 
convenient vehicle to the homes of these girls — all 
of whom belonged to church. Girls over eighteen 
who did not belong were subjects of much gossip 
and abuse. 

A report, in some inconceivable manner, soon 
became spread that Oscar Devereaux had said 
that he wanted to die and go to hell. Such a 
sensation! I was approached on all sides by men 
and women, regardless of the time of day or night, 
by the young men who gloried in their conversion 
and who urged me to "get right" with Jesus before 
it was too late. I do not remember how long 
these meetings lasted but they suddenly came to 
an end when notice was served on the church trustees 
by the city council, which irreverently declared 

^that so many converts every afternoon and night 
was disturbing the white neighborhood's rest as 



TheConquest 21 

well as their nerves. It ordered windows and doors 
to be kept closed during services, and as the church 
was small it was impossible to house the congre- 
gation and all the converts, so the revival ended 
and the community was restored to normal and 
calm once more prevailed. 

That was in September. One Sunday afternoon 
in October, as I was walking along the railroad 
track, I chanced to overhear voices coming from 
under a water tank, where a space of some eight or 
ten feet enclosed by four huge timbers made a 
small, secluded place. I stopped, listened and was 
sure I recognized the voices of Douglas Brock, his 
brother Melvin, and two other well known colored 
boys. Douglas was betting a quarter with one of 
the other boys that he couldn't pass. (You who 
know the dice and its vagaries will know what he 
meant.) This was mingled with words and com- 
mands from Melvin to the dice in trying to make 
some point. It must have been four. He would 
let out a sort of yowl; "Little Joe, can't you do it?" 
I went my way. I didn't shoot craps nor drink 
neither did I belong to church but was called a 
dreadful sinner while three of the boys under the 
tank had, not less than six weeks before, joined 
church and were now full-fledged members in good 
standing. Of course I did not consider that all 
people who belonged to church were not Christians, 
but was quite sure that many were not. 

The following January a relative of mine got a 
job for me bailing water in a coal mine in a little 
town inhabited entirely by negroes. I worked from 
six o'clock P. M. to six A. M., and received two 



22 The Conquest 

dollars and twenty-five cents therefor. The work 
was rough and hard and the mine very dark. The 
smoke hung like a cloud near the top of the tunnel- 
like room during all the night. This was because 
the fans were all but shut off at night, and just 
enough air was pumped in to prevent the forma- 
tion of black damp. The smoke made my head 
ache until I felt stupid and the dampness made me 
ill, but the two dollars and twenty-five cents per 
day looked good to me. After six weeks, however, 
I was forced to quit, and with sixty-five dollars — 
more money than I had ever had — I went to see 
my older sister who was teaching in a nearby town. 

I had grown into a strong, husky youth of eighteen 
and my sister was surprised to see that I was work- 
ing and taking care of myself so well. She shared 
the thought of nearly all of my acquaintances that 
I was too lazy to leave home and do hard work, 
especially in the winter time. After awhile she 
suddenly looked at me and spoke as though afraid 
she would forget it, "0,Oscar! I've got a girl for you; 
what do you think of that?" smiling so pleasantly, 
I was afraid she was joking. You see, I had never 
been very successful with the girls and when she 
mentioned having a girl for me my heart was all 
a flutter and when she hesitated I put in eagerly. 

"Aw go on — quit your kidding. On the level 
now, or are you just chiding me?" But she took 
on a serious expression and speaking thoughtfully, 
she went on. 

"Yes, she lives next door and is a nice little girl, 
and pretty. The prettiest colored girl in town." 

Here I lost interest for I remembered my sister 



The Conquest 23 

was foolish about beauty and I said that I didn't 
care to meet her. I was suspicious when it came to 
the pretty type of girls, and had observed that the 
prettiest girl in town was oft times petted and spoiled 
and a mere butterfly. 

"0 why?" She spoke like one hurt. Then I 
confessed my suspicions. "0, You're foolish/' 
she exclaimed softly, appearing relieved. "Be- 
sides," she went on brightly "Jessie isn't a spoiled 
girl, you wait until you meet her." And in spite 
of my protests she sent the landlady's little girl 
off for Miss Rooks. She came over in about an 
hour and I found her to be demure and thoughtful, 
as well as pretty. She was small of stature, had 
dark eyes and beautiful wavy, black hair, and an 
olive complexion. She wouldn't allow me to look 
into her eyes but continued to cast them downward, 
sitting with folded hands and answering when spoken 
to in a tiny voice quite in keeping with her small 
person. 

During the afternoon I mentioned that I was 
going to Chicago, "Now Oscar, you've got no 
business in Chicago," my sister spoke up with a 
touch of authority. "You're too young, and 
besides," she asked "do you know whether W. 0. 
wants you?" W. 0. was our oldest brother and 
was then making Chicago his home. 

"Huh!" I snorted "I'm going on my own hook," 
and drawing up to my full six feet I tried to look 
brave, which seemed to have the desired effect 
on my sister. 

"Well" she said resignedly, "you must be careful 
and^not get into bad company — be good and try 
to make a man of yourself." 




24 TheConquest 

CHAPTER III 

CHICAGO, CHASING A WILL-O-THE-WISP 

HAT was on Sunday morning three hun- 
dred miles south of Chicago, and at 
nine-forty that night I stepped off the 
New Orleans and Chicago fast mail 
into a different world. It was, I believe, the 
coldest night that I had ever experienced. The 
city was new and strange to me and I wandered 
here and there for hours before I finally found my 
brother's address on Armour Avenue. But the 
wandering and anxiety mattered little, for I was 
in the great city where I intended beginning my 
career, and felt that bigger things were in store 
for me. 

The next day my brother's landlady appeared 
to take a good deal of interest in me and encouraged 
me so that I became quite confidential, and told 
her of my ambitions for the future and that it was 
my intention to work, save my money and even- 
tually become a property owner. I was rather 
chagrined later, however, to find that she had 
repeated all this to my brother and he gave me a 
good round scolding, accompanied by the un- 
solicited advice that if I would keep my mouth shut 
people wouldn't know I was so green. He had been 
traveling as a waiter on an eastern railroad dining 
car, but in a fit of independence — which had always 
been characteristic of him — had quit, and now in 
mid- winter, was out of a job. He was not en- 
thusiastic concerning my presence in the city and 



TheConquest 25 

I had found him broke, but with a lot of fine clothes 
and a diamond or two. Most folks from the country 
don't value good clothes and diamonds in the way- 
city folks do and I, for one, didn't think much of 
his finery. 

I was greatly disappointed, for I had anticipated 
that my big brother would have accumulated some 
property or become master of a bank account 
during these five or six years he had been away 
from home. He seemed to sense this disappoint- 
ment and became more irritated at my presence 
and finally wrote home to my parents — who had 
recently moved to Kansas — charging me with the- 
crime of being a big, awkward, ignorant kid, un- 
sophisticated in the ways of the world, and especially 
of the city; that I was likely to end my " career" 
by running over a street car and permitting the city 
to irretrievably lose me, or something equally as 
bad. When I heard from my mother she was 
worried and begged me to come home. I knew the 
folks at home shared my brother's opinion of me 
and believed all he had told them, so I had a good 
laugh all to myself in spite of the depressing effect 
it had on me. However, there was the reaction, 
and when it set in I became heartsick and dis- 
couraged and then and there became personally 
acquainted with the " blues", who gave me their 
undivided attention for some time after that. 

The following Sunday I expected him to take 
me to church with him, but he didn't. He went 
alone, wearing his five dollar hat, fifteen dollar 
made-to-measure shoes, forty-five dollar coat and 
vest, eleven dollar trousers, fifty dollar tweed 



26 The Conquest 

overcoat and his diamonds. I found my way to 

church alone and when I saw him sitting reservedly 

in an opposite pew, I felt snubbed and my heart 

sank. However, only momentarily, for a new light 

f dawned upon me and I saw the snobbery and folly 

\oi it all and resolved that some day I would rise 

f head and shoulders above that foolish, four-flushing 

brother of mine in real and material success. 

I finally secured irregular employment at the 
Union Stock Yards. The wages at that time were 
not the best. Common labor a dollar-fifty per day 
and the hours very irregular. Some days I was 
called for duty at five in the morning and laid off 
at three in the afternoon or called again at eight in 
the evening to work until nine the same evening. 
I soon found the mere getting of jobs to be quite 
easy. It was getting a desirable one that gave me 
trouble. However, when I first went to the yards 
and looked at the crowds waiting before the office 
in quest of employment, I must confess I felt 
rather discouraged, but my new surroundings and 
that indefinable interesting feature about these 
crowds with their diversity of nationalities and 
ambitions, made me forget my own little disap- 
pointments. Most all new arrivals, whether skilled 
or unskilled workmen, seeking ' 'jobs" in the city 
find their way to the yards. Thousands of unskilled 
laborers are employed here and it seems to be the 
Mecca for the down-and-out who wander thither in 
a last effort to obtain employment. 

The people with whom I stopped belonged to 
the servant class and lived neatly in their Armour 
Avenue flat. The different classes of people who 



The Conquest 27 

make up the population of a great city are segre- 
gated more by their occupations than anything 
else. The laborers usually live in a laborer's neigh- 
borhood. Tradesmen find it more agreeable among 
their fellow workmen and the same is true of the 
servants and others. I found that employment 
which soiled the clothes and face and hands was 
out of keeping among the people with whom I 
lived, so after trying first one job, then another, I 
went to Joliet, Illinois, to work out my fortune in 
the steel mills of that town. I was told that at 
that place was an excellent opportunity to learn a 
trade, but after getting only the very roughest kind 
of work to do around the mills, such as wrecking 
and carrying all kinds of broken iron and digging 
in a canal along with a lot of jabbering foreigners 
whose English vocabulary consisted of but one 
word — their laborer's number. It is needless to 
say that I saw little chance of learning a trade at 
any very early date. 

Pay day "happened" every two weeks with two 
weeks held back. If I quit it would be three weeks 
before I could get my wages, but was informed of a 
scheme by which I could get my money, by telling 
the foreman that I was going to leave the state. 
Accordingly, I approached the renowned imbecile 
and told him that I was going to California and 
would have to quit and would like to get my pay. 
"Pay day is every two weeks, so be sure to get 
back in time/' he answered in that officious manner 
so peculiar to foremen. I had only four dollars 
coming, so I quit anyway. 

That evening I became the recipient of the 



28 TheConquest 

illuminating information that if I would apply at 
the coal chutes I would find better employment as 
well as receive better wages. I sought out the 
fellow in charge, a big colored man weighing about 
two hundred pounds, who gave me work cracking 
and heaving coal into the chute at a dollar-fifty 
per twenty-five tons. 

"Gracious", I expostulated. "A man can't do 
all of that in a day". 

"Pooh", and he waved his big hands depreciat- 
ingly, "I have heaved forty tons with small effort". 

I decided to go to work that day, but with many 
misgivings as to cracking and shoveling twenty-five 
tons of coal. The first day I managed, by dint of 
hard labor, to crack and heave eighteen tons out 
of a box car, for which I received the munificent 
sum of one dollar, and the next day I fell to sixteen 
tons and likewise to eighty-nine cents. The con- 
tractor who superintended the coal business bought 
me a drink in a nearby saloon, and as I drank it with 
a gulp he patted me on the shoulder, saying, "Now, 
after the third day, son, you begin to improve and 
at the end of a week you can heave thirty tons a 
day as easily as a clock ticking the time". I 
thought he was going to add that I would be shovel- 
ing forty tons like Big Jim, the fellow who gave 
me the job, but I cut him off by telling him that 
I'd resign before I became so proficient. 

I had to send for more money to pay my board. 
My brother, being my banker, sent a statement of 
my account, showing that I had to date just twenty- 
five dollars, and the statement seemed to read 
coldly between the lines that I would soon be 



TheConquest 29 

broke, out of a job, and what then? I felt very- 
serious about the matter and when I returned to 
Chicago I had lost some of my confidence regarding 
my future. Mrs. Nelson, the landlady, boasted 
that her husband made twenty dollars per week; 
showed me her diamonds and spoke so very highly 
of my brother, that I suspicioned that she admired 
him a great deal, and that he was in no immediate 
danger of losing his room even when he was out of 
work and unable to meet his obligations. 

My next step was to let an employment agency 
swindle me out of two dollars. Their system was 
quite unique, and, I presume, legitimate. They 
persuaded the applicant to deposit three dollars as 
a guarantee of good faith, after which they were to 
find a position for him. A given percentage was 
also to be taken from the wages for a certain length 
of time. Some of these agencies may have been 
all right, but my old friend, the hoodoo, led me to 
one that was an open fraud. After the person 
seeking employment has been sent to several places 
for imaginary positions that prove to be only myths, 
the agency offers to give back a dollar and the dis- 
gusted applicant is usually glad to get it. I, my- 
self, being one of many of these unfortunates. 

I then tried the newspaper ads. There is usually 
some particular paper in any large city that makes 
a specialty of want advertisements. I was told, as 
was necessary, to stand at the door when the paper 
came from the press, grab a copy, choose an ad 
that seemed promising and run like wild for the 
address given. I had no trade, so turned to the 
miscellaneous column, and as I had no references 



30 TheConquest 

I looked for a place where none were required. If 
the address was near I would run as fast as the 
crowded street and the speed laws would permit, 
but always found upon arrival that someone had 
just either been accepted ahead of me, or had been 
there a week. I having run down an old ad that 
had been permitted to run for that time. About 
the only difference I found between the newspapers 
and the employment agencies was that I didn't 
have to pay three dollars for the experience. 

I now realized the disadvantages of being an un- 
skilled laborer, and had grown weary of chasing a 
"will-o-the-wisp" and one day while talking to a 
small Indian-looking negro I remarked that I wished 
I could find a job in some suburb shining shoes in a 
barber shop or something that would take me away 
from Chicago and its dilly-dally jobs for awhile. 

"I know where you can get a job like that", he 
answered, thoughtfully. 

" Where?" I asked eagerly. 

"Why, out at Eaton", he went on, "a suburb 
about twenty-five miles west. A fellow wanted 
me to go but I don't want to leave Chicago". 

I found that most of the colored people with whom 
I had become acquainted who lived in Chicago very 
long were similarly reluctant about leaving, but I 
was ready to go anywhere. So my new friend took 
me over to a barber supply house on Clark street, 
where a man gave me the name of the barber at 
Eaton and told me to come by in the morning and 
he'd give me a ticket to the place. When I got on 
the street again I felt so happy and grateful to my 
friend for the information, that I gave the little 
mulatto a half dollar, all the money I had with 



The Co n q u e s t 31 

me, and had to walk the forty blocks to my room. 
Here I filled my old grip and the next morning 
"beat it" for Eaton, arriving there on the first of 
May, and a cold, bleak, spring morning it was. I 
found the shop without any trouble — a dingy little 
place with two chairs. The proprietor, a drawn, 
unhappy looking creature, and a hawkish looking 
German assistant welcomed me cordially. They 
seemed to need company. The proprietor led me 
upstairs to a room that I could have free with an 
oil stove and table where I could cook — so I made 
arrangements to "bach". 

I received no wages, but was allowed to retain 
all I made "shining". I had acquired some ex- 
perience shining shoes on the streets of M — pis 
with a home-made box — getting on my knees when- 
ever I got a customer. "Shining shoes" is not 
usually considered an advanced or technical occupa- 
tion requiring skill. However, if properly conducted 
it can be the making of a good solicitor. While 
Eaton was a suburb it was also a country town and 
this shop was never patronized by any of the 
metropolitan class who made their homes there, but 
principally by the country class who do not evidence 
their city pride by the polish of their shoes. Few 
city people allow their shoes to go unpolished and 
I wasn't long in finding it out, and when I did I 
had something to say to the men who went by, 
well dressed but with dirty shoes. If I could argue 
them into stopping, if only for a moment, I could 
nearly always succeed in getting them into the 
chair. 

Business, however, was dull and I began taking 
jobs in the country from the farmers, working 



32 TheConquest 

through the day and getting back to the shop for 
the evening. This, however, was short lived, for I 
was unaccustomed to farm work since leaving home 
and found it extremely difficult. My first work in 
the country was pitching timothy hay side-by-side 
with a girl of sixteen, who knew how to pitch hay. 
I thought it would be quite romantic before I 
started, but before night came I had changed my 
mind. The man on the wagon would drive along- 
side a big cock of sweet smelling hay and the girl 
would stick her fork partly to one side of the hay 
cock and show me how to put my fork into the 
other. I was left-handed while she was right, and 
with our backs to the wagon we could make a heavy 
lift and when the hay was directly overhead we'd 
turn and face each other and over the load would 
go onto the wagon. Toward evening the loads 
thus balanced seemed to me as heavy as the load 
of Atlas bearing the earth. I am sure my face dis- 
closed the fatigue and strain under which I labored, 
for it was clearly reflected in the knowing grin of 
my companion. I drew my pay that night on the 
excuse of having to get an overall suit, promising to 
be back at a quarter to seven the next morning. 

Then I tried shocking oats along with a boy of 
about twelve, a girl of fourteen and the farmer's 
wife. The way those two children did work, — 
Whew! I was so glad when a shower came up 
about noon that I refrained from shouting with 
difficulty. I drew my pay this time to get some 
gloves, and promised to be back as soon as it dried. 
The next morning I felt so sore and stiff as the 
result of my two days' experience in the harvest 



TheConquest 33 

fields, that I forgot all about my promise to return 
and decided to stay in Eaton. 

It was in Eaton that I started my first bank 
account. The little twenty-dollar certificate of 
deposit opened my mind to different things entirely. 
I would look at it until I had day dreams. During 
the three months I spent in Eaton I laid the foun- 
dation of a future. Simple as it was, it led me into 
channels which carried me away from my race and 
into a life fraught with excitement; a life that gave 
experiences and other things I had never dreamed 
of. I had started a bank account of twenty dollars 
and I found myself wanting one of thirty, and to 
my surprise the desire seemed to increase. This 
desire fathered my plans to become a porter on a 

P n car. A position I diligently sought and 

applied for between such odd jobs about town 
as mowing lawns, washing windows, scrubbing 
floors and a variety of others that kept me quite 
busy. Taking the work, if I could, by contract, 
thus permitting me to use my own time and to 
work as hard as I desired to finish. I found that 
by this plan I could make money faster and easier 
than by working in the country. 

I was finally rewarded by being given a run on 
a parlor car by a road that reached many summer 
resorts in southern Wisconsin. Here I skimped 
along on a run that went out every Friday and Satur- 
day, returning on Monday morning. The regular 
salary was forty dollars per month, but as I never 
put in more than half the time I barely made twenty 
dollars, and altho' I made a little "on the side" in 
the way of tips I had to draw on the money I had 
saved in Eaton. 



IT 



34 TheConquest 

CHAPTER IV 

THE P N COMPANY 

|HE P n Company is a big palace, 

dining and sleeping car company that 
most American people know a great 
deal about. I had long desired to have 
a run on one of the magnificent sleepers that oper- 
ated out of Chicago to every part of North America, 
that I might have an opportunity to see the country 
and make money at the same time, and from Monday 
to Friday I had nothing to do but report at one of 

the three P n offices in my effort to get such a 

position. One office where I was particularly at- 
tentive, operated cars on four roads, so I called on 
this office about twice a week, but a long, slim chief 
clerk whose chair guarded the entrance to the 
Superintendent's office would drawl out lazily: 
"We don't need any men today." I had been 
to the office a number of times before I left Eaton 
and had heard his drawl so often that I grew nervous 
whenever he looked at me. That district employed 
over a thousand porters and there was no doubt 
that they hired them every day. One day I was 
telling my troubles to a friendly porter whom I 
later learned to be George Cole (former husband 
of the present wife of Bert Williams, the comedian)* 
He advised me to see Mr. Miltzow,the Superinten- 
dent. 

"But I can never see him" I said despairingly, 
"for that long imbecile of a clerk." 
"Jump him some day when he is on the way from 



TheConquest 35 

luncheon, talk fast, tell him how you have been 
trying all summer to 'get on', the old man" he said, 
referring to the superintendent, "likes big, stout 
youngsters like you, so try it." The next day I 
watched him from the street and when he started 
to descend the long stairway to his office, I gathered 
my courage and stepped to his side. I told him how 
I had fairly haunted his office, only to be turned 
away regularly by the same words; that I would 
like a position if he would at any time need any 
men. He went into his office, leaving me standing 
at the railing, where I held my grounds in defiance 
of the chief clerk's insolent stare. After a few 
minutes he looked up and called out "Come in 
here, you." As I stood before him he looked me 
over searchingly and inquired as to whether I had 
any references. 

"No Sir," I answered quickly, "but I can get 
them." I was beside myself with nervous excite- 
ment and watched him eagerly for fear he might 
turn me away at the physicological moment, and 
that I would fail to get what I had wanted so long. 

"Well," he said in a decisive tone, "get good 
references, showing what you have been doing for 
the last five years, bring them around and Til talk 
to you." 

"Thank you Sir," I blurted out and with hopes 
soaring I hurried out and down the steps. Going to 
my room, I wrote for references to people in M — pis 
who had known me all my life. Of course they 
sent me the best of letters, which I took immediately 
to Mr. Miltzow's office. After looking them over 
carelessly he handed them to his secretary asking 



36 TheConquest 

me whether I was able to buy a uniform. When I 
answered in the affirmative he gave me a letter to 
the company's tailor, and one to the instructor, who 
the next day gave me my first lessons in a car called 
the "school" in a nearby railroad yard placed there 
for that purpose. I learned all that was required 
in a day, although he had some pupils who had 
been with him five days before I started and who 
graduated with me. I now thought I was a full- 
fledged porter and was given an order for equipment, 
combs, brushes, etc., a letter from the instructor 
to the man that signed out the runs, a very apt 
appearing young man with a gift for remembering 
names and faces, who instructed me to report on 
the morrow. The thought of my first trip the next 
day, perhaps to some distant city I had never 
seen, caused me to lie awake the greater part of 
the night. 

When I went into -the porter's room the next day, 
or "down in the hole," as the basement was called, 
and looked into the place, I found it crowded with 
men, and mostly old men at that and I felt sure it 
would be a long time before I was sent out. How- 
ever, I soon learned that the most of them were 
"emergency men" or emergies, men who had been 
discharged and who appeared regularly in hopes of 
getting a car that could not be supplied with a 
regular man. 

There was one by the name of Knight, a pitiable 
and forlorn character in whose breast "hope sprang 
eternal," who came to the "hole" every day, and 
in an entire year he had made one lone trip. He 
lived by "mooching" a dime, quarter or fifty cents 



TheConquest 37 

from first one porter then another and by helping 
some porters make down beds in cars that went 
out on midnight trains. It was said that he had 
been discharged on account of too strict adherence 
to duty. Every member of a train crew, whether 
porter, brukeman or conductor, must carry a book 
of rules; more as a matter of form than to show to 
passengers as Knight had done. A trainman 
should, and does, depend more on his judgment than 
on any set of rules, and permits the rule to be 
stretched now and then to fit circumstances. 
Knight, however, courted his rule book and when 
a passenger requested some service that the rules 
prohibited, such for instance as an extra pillow to 
a berth, and if the passenger insisted or showed 
dissatisfaction Knight would get his book of rules, 
turn to the chapter which dwelt on the subject and 
read it aloud to the already disgruntled passenger, 
thereby making more or less of a nuisance to the 
traveling public. 

But I am disgressing. Fred, the "sign-out-clerk" 
came along and the many voices indulging in loud 
and raucous conversation so characteristic of porters 
off duty, gave way to respectful silence. He looked 
favorably on the regular men but seemed to pass up 
the emergies as he entered. The poor fellows didn't 
expect to be sent out but it seemed to fascinate 
them to hear the clerk assign the regular men their 
cars to some distant cities in his cheerful language 
such as: "Hello! Brooks, where did you come from? 
— From San Antonio? Well take the car ' Litch- 
field' to Oakland; leaves on Number Three at 
eleven o'clock to-night over the B. & R. N.; have 



38 TheConquest 

the car all ready, eight lowers made down." And 
from one to the other he would go, signing one to 
go east and another west. Respectfully silent and 
attentive the men's eyes would follow him as he 
moved on, each and every man eager to know 
where he would be sent. 

Finally he got to me. He had an excellent mem- 
ory and seemed to know all men by name. "Well 
Devereaux," he said, "do you think that you can 
run a car?" 

"Yes Sir!" I answered quickly. He fumbled his 
pencil thoughtfully while I waited nervously then 
went on: 

"And you feel quite capable of running a car, do 
you?" 

"Yes Sir" I replied with emphasis 1 "I learned 
thoroughly yesterday." 

"Well, "he spoke as one who has weighed the 
matter and is not quite certain but willing to risk, 
and taking his pad and pencil he wrote, speaking 
at the same time, "You go out to the Ft. Wayne 
yards and get on the car 'Altata', goes extra to 
Washington D. C. at three o'clock; put away the 
linen, put out combs, brushes and have the car in 
order when the train backs down." 

"Yes Sir," and I hurried out of the room, up the 
steps and onto the street where I could give vent to 
my elation. To Washington, first of all places. 
Glory! and I fairly flew out to Sixteenth street 
where the P. F. & W. passenger yards were located. 
Here not less than seven hundred passenger and 

and P n cars are cleaned and put in readiness 

for each trip daily, and standing among them I 



TheConquest 39 

found the Altata. wonderful name! She was 
a brand new observation car just out of the shops. 
I dared not believe my eyes, and felt that there 
must be some mistake; surely the company didn't 
expect to send me out with such a fine car on my 
first trip. But I should have known better, for 

among the many thousands of P n cars with 

their picturesque names, there was not another 
"Altata." I looked around the yards and finally 
inquired of a cleaner as to where the Altata was. 

"Right there," he said, pointing to the car I had 
been looking at and I boarded her nervously; found 
the linen and lockers but was at a loss to know how 
and where to start getting the car in order. I was 
more than confused and what I had learned so 
quickly the day before had vanished like smoke. 
I was afraid too, that if I didn't have the car in 
order Fd be taken off when the train backed down 
and become an "emergie" myself. This shocked 
me so it brought me to my senses and I got busy 
putting the linen somewhere and when the train 
stopped in the shed the car, as well as myself, was 
fairly presentable and ready to receive. 

Then came the rush of passengers with all their 
attending requests for attention. "Ah Poiter, put 
my grip in Thoiteen," and "Ah Poiter, will you raise 
my window and put in a deflector? " Holy Smither- 
ines! I rushed back and forth like a lost calf, trying 
to recall what a deflector was, and I couldn't dis- 
tinguish thoiteen from three. Then — "Ah, Poiter, 
will you tell me when we get to Valparaiso?" called 
a little blonde lady, "You see, I have a son who is 
attending the Univoisity theah — now Poiter don't 
don't forget please" she asked winsomely. 



40 TheConquest 

"Oh! No, Maam," I assured her confidently that 
I never forgot anything. My confusion became so 
intense had I gotten off the car I'd probably not 
have known which way to get on again. 

The clerk seemed to sense my embarrassment 
and helped me seat the passengers in their proper 
places, as well as to answer the numerous questions 
directed at me. The G. A. R. encampment was 
on in Washington and the rush was greater than 
usual on that account. By the time the train 
reached Valparaiso I had gotten somewhat ac- 
customed to the situation and recalled my promise 
to the little blonde lady and filled it. She had been 
asleep and it was raining to beat-the-band. With 
a sigh she looked out of the window and then turned 
on her side and fell asleep again. At Pittsburg I 
was chagrined to be turned back and sent over the 
P. H. & D. to Chicago. 

At Columbus, Ohio, we took on a colored preacher 
who had a ticket for an upper berth over a Souther- 
ner who had the lower. The Southern gentleman 
in that "holier than thou" attitude made a vigorous 
kick to the conductor to have the colored "Sky- 
pilot/' as he termed him, removed. I heard the 
conductor tell him gently but firmly, that he couldn't 
do it. Then after a few characteristic haughty 
remarks the Southerner went forward to the chair 
car and sat up all night. When I got the shoes 
shined and lavatory ready for the morning rush I 
slipped into the Southerner's berth and had a good 
snooze. However, longer than it should have been, 
for the conductor found me the next morning as the 
train was pulling into Chicago. He threatened 



The Conquest 41 

to report me but when I told him that it was my 
first trip out, that I hadn't had any sleep the night 
before and none the night before that on account 
of my restlessnes in anticipation of the trip, he re- 
lented and helped me to make up the beds. 

I barely got to my room before I was called to 
go out again. This time going through to Washing- 
ton. The P. F. & W. tracks pass right through 
Washington's ''black belt" and it might be interest- 
ing to the reader to know that Washington has more 
colored people than any other American city. I 
had never seen so many colored people. In fact, 
the entire population seemed to be negroes. There 
was an old lady from South Dakota on my car who 
seemed surprised at the many colored people and 
after looking quite intently for some time she 
touched me on the sleeve, whispering, " Porter, 
aren't there anything but colored people here?" 
I replied that it seemed so. 

At the station a near-mob of colored boys huddled 
before the steps and I thought they would fairly 
take the passengers off their feet by the way they 
crowded around them. However, they were harm- 
less and only wanted to earn a dime by carrying 
grips. Two of them got a jui jitsu grip on that of 
the old lady from South Dakota, and to say that 
she became frightened would be putting it mildly. 
Just then a policeman came along and the boys 
scattered like flies and the old lady seemed much 
relieved. Having since taken up my abode in that 
state myself, and knowing that there were but few 
negroes inhabiting it, I have often wondered since 
how she must have felt on that memorable trip 
of hers, as well as mine. 



42 TheConquest 

After working some four months on various and 
irregular runs that took me to all the important 
cities of the United States east of the Mississippi 
River, I was put on a regular run to Portland, 
Oregon. This was along in February and about 
the same time that I banked my first one hundred 
dollars. If my former bank account had stirred my 
ambition and become an incentive to economy and 
a life of modest habits, the larger one put everything 
foolish and impractical entirely out of my mind, and 
economy, modesty and frugality became fixed habits 
of my life. 

At a point in Wyoming on my run to Portland 
my car left the main line and went over another 
through Idaho and Oregon. From there no berth 
tickets were sold by the station agents and the con- 
ductors collected the cash fares, and had for many 
years mixed the company's money with their own. 
I soon found myself in the mire along with the con- 
ductors. "Getting in" was easy and tips were 
good for a hundred dollars a month and sometimes 
more. "Good Conductors," a name applied to 
"color blind" cons, were worth seventy-five, and 
with the twenty-five dollar salary from the com- 
pany, I averaged two hundred dollars a month for 
eighteen months. 

There is something fascinating about railroading, 
and few men really tire of it. In fact, most men, 
like myself, rather enjoy it. I never tired of hearing 
the t-clack of the trucks and the general roar of 
the train as it thundered over streams and crossings 
throughout the days and nights across the con- 
tinent to the Pacific coast. The scenery never grew 



TheConquest 43 

old, as it was quite varied between Chicago and 
North Platte. During the summer it is one large 
garden farm, dotted with numerous cities, thriving 
hamlets and towns, fine country homes so char- 
acteristic of the great middle west, and is always 
pleasing to the eye. 

Between North Platte and Julesburg, Colorado, 
is the heart of the semi-arid region, where the yearly 
rainfall is insufficient to mature crops, but where 
the short buffalo grass feeds the rancher's herds 
winter and summer. As the car continues west- 
ward, climbing higher and higher as it approaches 
the Rockies, the air becomes quite rare. At Chey- 
enne the air is so light it blows a gale almost steadily, 
and the eye can discern objects for miles away while 
the ear cannot hear sounds over twenty rods. I 
shall not soon forget how I was wont to gaze at the 
herds of cattle ten to thirty miles away grazing 
peacefully on the great Laramie plains to the south, 
while beyond that lay the great American Rockies, 
their ragged peaks towering above in great sep- 
ulchral forms, filling me alternately with a feeling 
of romance or adventure, depending somewhat on 
whether it was a story of the "Roundup," or some 
other article typical of the west, I was reading. 

Nearing the Continental divide the car pulls 
into Rawlins, which is about the highest, driest and 
most uninviting place on the line. From here the 
stage lines radiate for a hundred miles to the north 
and south. Near here is Medicine Bow, where Owen 
Wister lays the beginning scenes of the "Virginian"; 
and beyond lies Rock Springs, the home of the 
famous coal that bears its name and which com- 



44 TheConquest 

mands the highest price of any bituminous coal. 
The coal lies in wide veins, the shafts run hori- 
zontally and there are no deep shafts as there are 
in the coal fields of Illinois and other Central states. 

From here the train descends a gentle slope to 
Green River, Wyoming, a division point in the 
U. P. South on the D. & R. G. is Green River, Utah. 
Arriving at Granger one feels as though he had 
arrived at the jumping off place of creation. Like 
most all desert stations it contains nothing of in- 
terest and time becomes a bore. Here the traffic 
is divided and the 0. S. L. takes the Portland and 
Butte section into Idaho where the scenery suddenly 
begins to get brighter. Indeed, the country seems 
to take on a beautiful and cheerful appearance; 
civilization and beautiful farms take the place of 
the wilderness, sage brush and skulking coyotes. 
Thanks to the irrigation ditch. 

After crossing the picturesque American Falls 
of Snake River, the train soon arrives at Minidoka. 
This is the seat of the great Minidoka project, in 
which the United States Government has taken 
such an active interest and constructed a canal 
over seventy miles in length. This has converted 
about a quarter of a million acres of Idaho's volcanic 
ash soil into productive lands that bloom as the 
rose. It was the beautiful valley of the Snake 
River, with its indescribable scenery and its many 
beautiful little cities, that attracted my attention 
and looked as though it had/a promising future. I 
had contemplated investing in some of its lands 
and locating, if I should happen to be compelled 
by stress of circumstances to change my occupation. 
This came to pass shortly thereafter. 



TheConquest 45 

The end came after a trip between Granger and 
Portland, in company with a shrewd Irish conductor 
by the name of Wright, who not only "knocked 
down" the company's money, but drank a good 
deal more whiskey than was good for him. On this 
last trip, when Wright took charge of the car at 
Granger, he began telling about his newly acquired 
"dear little wifey." Also confiding to me that he 
had quit drinking and was going to quit "knocking 
down" — after that trip. Oh, yes! Wright was 
always going to dispense with all things dishonest 
and dishonorable — at some future date. Another 
bad thing about Wright was that he would steal, 
not only from the company, but from the porter 
as well, by virtue of the rule that required the porter 
to take a duplicate receipt from the conductor for 
each and every passenger riding on his car, whether 
the passenger has a ticket or pays cash fare. These 
receipts are forwarded to the Auditor of the com- 
pany at the end of each run. 

Wright's method of stealing from the porter was 
not to turn over any duplicates or receipts until 
arriving at the terminus. Then he would choose 
a time when the porter was very busy brushing 
the passengers' clothes and getting the tips, and 
would then have no time to count up or tell just 
how many people had ridden. I had received in- 
formation from others concerning him and was 
cautioned to watch. So on our first trip I quietly 
checked up all the passengers as they got on and 
where they got off, as well as the berth or seat they 
occupied. Arriving at Granger going east he gave 
me the wink and taking me into the smoking room 
he proceeded to give me the duplicates and divide 



46 TheConquest 

the spoils. He gave me six dollars, saying he had 
cut such and such a passenger's fare and that was 
my part. I summed up and the amount "knocked 
down" was thirty-one dollars. I showed him my 
figures and at the same time told him to hand 
over nine-fifty more. How he did rage and swear 
about the responsibilities being all on him, that he 
did all the collecting and the "dirty work" in con- 
nection therewith, that the company didn't fire 
the porter. He said before he would concede to 
my demands he would turn all the money in to the 
company and report me for insolence. I sat calmly 
through it all and when he had exhausted his vitu- 
perations I calmly said "nine-fifty, please." I 
had no fear of his doing any of the things threatened 
for I had dealt with grafting conductors long enough 
to know that when they determined on keeping a 
fare they weren't likely to turn in their portion to 
spite the porter, and Wright was no exception. 

But getting back to the last trip. An old lady 
had given me a quart of Old Crow Whiskey bottled 
in bond. There had been perhaps a half pint taken 
out. I thanked her profusely and put it in the 
locker, and since Wright found that he could not 
keep any of my share of the "knocked down" 
fares he was running straight — that is with me, 
and we were quite friendly, so I told him of the gift 
and where to find it if he wanted a "smile." In one 

end of the P n where the drawing room cuts 

off the main portion of the car, and at the beginning 
of the curved aisle and opposite to the drawing 
room, is the locker. When its door is open it 
completely closes the aisle, thus hiding a person from 



TheConquest 47 

view behind it. Before long I saw Wright open the 
door and a little later could hear him ease the bottle 
down after taking a drink. 

& When we got to Portland, Wright was feeling 
"about right" and the bottle was empty. As he 
divided the money with me he cried: "Let her run 
on three wheels." It was the last time he divided 
any of the company's money with a porter. When 
he stepped into the office at the end of that trip he 
was told that they "had a message from Ager" the 
assistant general superintendent, concerning him. 
Every employee knew that a message from this in- 
dividual meant "off goes the bean." I never saw 
Wright afterwards, for they "got" me too that trip. 

The little Irish conductor, who was considered 
the shrewdest of the shrewd, had run a long time 
and "knocked down" a great amount of the com- 
pany's money but the system of "spotting" event- 
ually got him as it does the best of them. 

I now had two thousand, three hundred and 
forty dollars in the bank. The odd forty I drew 
out, and left the remainder on deposit, packed 
my trunk and bid farewell to Armour Avenue and 
Chicago's Black Belt with its beer cans, drunken 
men and women, and turned my face westward with 
the spirit of Horace Greely before and his words 
"Go west, young man, and grow up with the coun- 
try" ringing in my ears. So westward I journeyed 
to the land of raw material, which my dreams had 
pictured to me as the land of real beginning, and 
where I was soon to learn more than a mere ob- 
server ever could by living in the realm of a great 
city. 




48 TheConquest 

CHAPTER V 

"go west young man and grow up with the 
country' ' 

|N justice to the many thousands of P 

— n porters, as well as many conductors, 
who were in the habit of retaining the 
company's money, let it be said that 
they are not the hungry thieves and dishonest 
rogues the general public might think them to be, 
dishonest as their conduct may seem to be. They 
were victims of a vicious system built up and winked 
at by the company itself. 

Before the day of the Inter-State Commerce 
Commission and anti-pass and two-cent-per-mile 
legislation, and when passengers paid cash fares, it 
was a matter of tradition with the conductors to 
knockdown, and nothing was said, although the 
conductors, as now, were fairly well paid and the 
company fully expected to lose some of the cash 
fares. 

In the case of the porters, however, the circum- 
stances are far more mitigating. At the time I was 
with the company there were, in round numbers, 
eight thousand porters in the service on tourist 
and standard sleepers who were receiving from a 
minimum of twenty-five dollars to not to exceed 
forty dollars per month, depending on length and 
desirability of service. Out of this he must furnish, 
for the first ten years , his own uniforms and cap, 
consisting of summer and winter suits at twenty 
and twenty-two dollars respectively. After ten 



TheConquest 49 

years of continuous service these things are furnished 
by the company. Then there is the board, lodging 
and laundry expense. Trainmen are allowed from 
fifty to sixty per cent off of the regular bill of fare, 
and at this price most any kind of a meal in an a- 
la-carte diner comes to forty and fifty cents. Be- 
sides, the waiters expect tips from the crew as 
well as from the passengers and make it more un- 
comfortable for them if they do not receive it than 
they usually do for the passenger. 

I kept an accurate itemized account of my living 
expenses, including six dollars per month for a room 
in Chicago, and economize as I would, making one 
uniform and cap last a whole year, I could not get 
the monthly expense below forty dollars — fifteen 
dollars more than my salary, and surely the com- 
pany must have known it and condoned any reason- 
able amount of "knock down" on the side to make 
up the deficiency in salary. The porter's "knock 
down" usually coming through the sympathy, good 
will and unwritten law of "knocking down" — that 
the conductor divide equally with the porter. All 
of which, however, is now fast becoming a thing of 
the past, owing to recent legislation, investigations 
and strict regulation of common carriers by Congress 
and the various laws of the states of the Union, 
with the added result that conductors' wages have 
increased accordingly. Few conductors today are 
foolish enough to jeopardize their positions by in- 
dulging in the old practice, and it leaves the porters 
in a sorry plight indeed. 

All in all, the system, while deceptive and dis- 
honest on its face, was for a time a tolerated evil, 
4 



50 The Conquest 

apparently sanctioned by the company and became 
a veritable disease among the colored employees 
who, without exception, received and kept the com- 
pany's money without a single qualm of conscience. 
It was a part of their duty to make the job pay 
something more than a part of their living expenses. 
Ignorant as many of the porters were, most of them 
knew that from the enormous profits made that the 
company could and should have paid them better 
wages, and I am sure that if they received living 
wages for their services it would have a great moral- 
izing effect on that feature of the service, and greatly 
add to the comfort of the traveling public. 

However, the greedy and inhuman attitude of 
this monoply toward its colored employees has just 
the opposite effect, and is demoralizing indeed. 
Thousands of black porters continue to give their 
services in return for starvation wages and are 
compelled to graft the company and the people 
for a living. 

Shortly before my cessation of activities in con- 
nection with the P n company it had a capi- 
talization of ninety-five million dollars, paying eight 
per cent dividend annually, and about two years 
after I was compelled to quit, it paid its stock- 
holders a thirty-five million dollar surplus which 
had accumulated in five years. Just recently a 
"melon was cut" of about a like amount and over 
eight thousand colored porters helped to accumulate 
it, at from twenty-five to forty dollars per month. 
A wonder it is that their condition does not breed 
such actual dishonesty and deception thatfsociety 
would be forced to take notice of it, and the traveling 



The Conquest 51 

public should be thankful for the attentive services 
given under these near-slave conditions. As for 
myself, the reader has seen how I made it "pay" 
and I have no apologies or regrets to offer. When 
that final reckoning comes, I am sure the angel 
clerk will pass all porters against whom nothing 
more serious appears than what I have heretofore 
related. 

While I was considered very fortunate by my 
fellow employees, the whole thing filled me with 
disgust. I suffered from a nervous worry and fear 
of losing my position all the time, and really felt 
relieved when the end came and I was free to pursue 
a more commendable occupation. 

In going out of the Superintendent's office on my 
farewell leave, the several opportunities I had seen 

during my experience with the P n company 

loomed up and marched in dress parade before me; 
the conditions of the Snake River valley and the 
constructiveness of the people who had turned the 
alkali desert into valuable farms worth from fifty 
to five hundred dollars an acre, thrilled me so that 
I had no misgivings for the future. But Destiny 
had other fields in view for me and did not send me 
to that land of Eden of which I had become so fond, 
in quest of fortune. Such a variety of scenes was 
surely an incentive to serious thought. 

What was termed inquisitiveness at home brought 
me a world of information abroad. This inquisitive- 
ness, combined with the observation afforded by 
such runs as those to Portland and around the circle 
and, perhaps, coming back by Washington D. C, 
gave practical knowledge. Often western sheep- 



52 TheConquest 

men, who were ready talkers, returning on my car 
from taking a shipment to Chicago, gave me some 
idea of farming and sheepraising. I remember 
thinking that Iowa would be a fine place to own a 
farm, but quickly gave up any further thought of 
owning one there myself. A farmer from Tama, 
that state, gave me the information. He was a 

beautiful decoration for a P n berth and 

a neatly made bed with three sheets, and I do not 
know what possessed him to ever take a sleeper, 
for he slept little that night — I am sure. The next 
morning about five o'clock, while gathering and 
shining shoes, I could not find his, and being curious, 
I peeped into his berth. What I saw made me laugh, 
indeed. There he lay, all bundled into his bed in his 
big fur overcoat and shoes on, just as he came into 
the car the evening before. He was awake and 
looked so uncomfortable that I suggested that he 
get up if he wasn't sleepy. "What say?" he an- 
swered, leaning over and sticking his head out of 
the berth as though afraid someone would grab 
him. 

As this class of farmers like to talk, and usually 
in loud tones, I led him into the smoking room as 
soon as he jumped out of his berth, to keep him from 
annoying other passengers. Here he washed his 
face, still keeping his coat on. 

"Remove your coat," I suggested, "and you will 
be more comfortable." 

"You bet," he said taking his coat off and sitting 
on it. Lighting his pipe, he began talking and I 
immediately inquired of him how much land he 
owned. 



. The Conquest 53 

He answered that he owned a section. "Gee! 
but that is a lot of land," I exclaimed, getting in- 
terested, "and what is it worth an acre?" 

"The last quarter I bought I paid eighty dollars 
an acre" he returned. That is over thirteen thou- 
sand and I could plainly see that my little two thou- 
sand dollar bank account wouldn't go very far in 
Iowa when it came to buying land. That was nine 
years ago and the same land today will sell around 
one hundred and fifty dollars an acre, and the "end 
is not yet." 

I concluded on one thing, and that was, if one 
whose capital was under eight or ten thousand dol- 
lars, desired to own a good farm in the great central 
west he must go where the land was new or raw and 
undeveloped. He must begin with the beginning 
and develop with the development of the country. 
By the proper and accepted methods of conserva- 
tion of the natural resources and close application 
to his work, his chances for success are good. 

When I finally reached this conclusion I began 
searching for a suitable location in which to try my 
fortune in the harrowing of the soil. 




54 The Conquest 

CHAPTER VI 

"AND WHERE IS ORISTOWN?" THE TOWN ON THE 
MISSOURI 

T came a few days later in a restaurant 
in Council Bluffs, Iowa, when I heard 
the waiters, one white man and the other 
colored, saying, "Fin going to Oris- 
town." "And where is Oristown?" I inquired, 
taking a stool and scrutinizing the bill of fare. 
"Oristown," the white man spoke up, drawing away 
at a pipe which gave him the appearance of being 
anything from a rover to a freight brakeman, "is 
about two hundred and fifty miles northwest of 
here in southern South Dakota, on the edge of 
the Little Crow Reservation, to be opened this 
summer." This is not the right name, but the 
name of an Indian chief living near where this is 
written. 

"Oristown is the present terminus of the C. & R. 
W. Ry. and he went on to tell me that the land in 
part was valuable, while some portions were no 
better than Western Nebraska. A part of the 
Reservation was to be opened to settlement by 
lottery that summer and the registration was to 
take place in July. It was now April. "And the 
registration is to come off at Oristown?" I finished 
for him with a question. "Yes," he assented. 

At Omaha the following day I chanced to meet 
two surveyors who had been sent out to the reserva- 
tion from Washington, D. C. and who told me to 
write to the Department of the Interior for infor- 



TheConquest 55 

mation regarding the opening, the lay of the land, 
quality of the soil, rainfall, etc. I did as they sug- 
gested and the pamphlets received stated that the 
land to be opened was a deep black loam, with clay 
subsoil, and the rainfall in this section averaged 
twenty-eight inches the last five years. I knew that 
Iowa had about thirty inches and most of the time 
was too wet, so concluded here at last was the place 
to go. This suited me better than any of the states 
or projects I had previously looked into, besides, I 
knew more about the mode of farming employed in 
that section of the country, it being somewhat 
similar to that in Southefn Illinois. 

On the morning of July fifth, at U. P. Transfer, 
Iowa, I took a train over the C. P. & St. L., which 
carried me to a certain town on the Missouri in 
South Dakota. I did not go to Oristown to register 
as I had intended but went to the town referred to, 
which had been designated as a registration point 
also. I was told by people who were " hitting" in 
the same direction and for the same purpose, that 
Oristown was crowded and lawless, with no place 
to sleep, and was overrun with tin-horn gamblers. 
It would be much better to go to the larger town on 
the Missouri, where better hotel accommodation 
and other conveniences could be had. So I bought 
a ticket to Johnstown, where I arrived late in the 
afternoon of the same day. There was a large crowd, 
which soon found its way to the main street, where 
numerous booths and offices were set up, with a 
notary in each to accept applications for the draw- 
ing. This consisted of taking oath that one was a 
citizen of the United States, twenty-one years of 



56 The Conquest 

of age or over. The head of a family, a widow, or 
any woman upon whom fell the support of a family, 
was also accepted. No person, however, owning 
over one hundred and sixty acres of land, or who had 
ever had a homestead before, could apply. The 
application was then enclosed in an envelope and 
directed to the Superintendent of the opening. 

After all the applications had been taken, they 
were thoroughly mixed and shuffled together. Then 
a blindfolded child was directed to draw one from 
the pile, which became number one in the opening. 
The lucky person whose oath was contained in 
such envelope was given the choice of all the land 
thrown open for settlement. Then another en- 
velope was drawn and that person was given the 
second choice, and so on until they were all drawn. 

This system was an out and out lottery, but gave 
each and every applicant an equal chance to draw 
a claim, but guaranteed none. Years before, land 
openings were conducted in a different manner. 
The applicants were held back of a line until a signal 
was given and then a general rush was made for 
the locations and settlement rights on the land. 
This worked fairly well at first but there grew to be 
more applicants than land, and two or more persons 
often located on the same piece of land and this 
brought about expensive litigation and annoying 
disputes and sometimes even murder, over the 
settlement. This was finally abolished in favor 
of the lottery system, which was at least safer and 
more profitable to the railroads that were fortunate 
enough to have a line to one or more of the registra- 
tion points. 




Became number one in the opening, (page 56) 



TheConquest 57 

At Johnstown, people from every part of the 
United States, of all ages and descriptions, gathered 
in crowded masses, the greater part of them being 
from Illinois, Iowa, Missouri, Minnesota, North 
Dakota, Kansas and Nebraska. When I started 
for the registration I was under the impression that 
only a few people would register, probably four or 
five thousand, and as there were twenty-four 
hundred homesteads I had no other thought than 
I would draw and later file on a quarter section. 
Imagine my consternation when at the end of the 
first day the registration numbered ten thousand. 
A colored farmer in Kansas had asked me to keep 
him posted in regard to the opening. He also 
thought of coming up and registering when he had 
completed his harvest. When the throngs of people 
began pouring in from the three railroads into 
Johnstown (and there were two other points of 
registration besides) I saw my chances of drawing 
a claim dwindling, from one to two, to one to ten, 
fifteen and twenty and maybe more. After three 
days in Johnstown I wrote my friend and told him 
I believed there would be fully thirty thousand 
people apply for the twenty-four hundred claims. 
The fifth day I wrote there would be fifty thousand. 
After a week I wrote there would be seventy-five 
thousand register, that it was useless to expect to 
draw and I was leaving for Kansas to visit my par- 
ents. When the registration was over I read in a 
Kansas City paper that one hundred and seven 
thousand persons had registered, making the change 
of drawing one to forty-four. 

Received a card soon after from the Superinten- 



58 The Conquest 

dent of the opening, which read that my number 
was 6504, and as the number of claims was approxi- 
mately twenty-four hundred, my number was too 
high to be reached before the land should all be 
taken. I think it was the same day I lost fifty- 
five dollars out of my pocket. This, combined 
with my disappointment in not drawing a piece 
of land, gave me a grouch and I lit out for the 
Louisiana Purchase Exposition at St. Louis with 

the intention of again getting into the P n 

service for a time. 

Of ttimes porters who had been discharged went 
to another city, changed their names, furnished 
a different set of references and got back to work 
for the same company. Now if they happened to 
be on a car that took them into the district from 
which they were discharged, and before the same 
officials, who of course recognized them, they were 
promptly reported and again discharged. I pon- 
dered over the situation and came to the conclusion 
that I would not attempt such deception, but avoid 
being sent back to the Chicago Western District. 
I was at a greater disadvantage than Johnson, 
Smith, Jackson, or a number of other common names, 
by having the odd French name that had always 
to be spelled slowly to a conductor, or any one else 
who had occasion to know me. Out of curiosity 
I had once looked in a Chicago Directory. Of 
some two million names there were just two others 
with the same name. But on the other hand it 
was much easier to avoid the Chicago Western 
District, or at least Mr. Miltzow's office and by 
keeping my own name, assume that I had never been 



TheConquest 59 

discharged, than it was to go into a half a dozen 
other districts with a new name and avoid being 
recognized. Arriving at this decision, I approached 
the St. Louis office, presented my references which 
had been furnished by other M — pis business men, 
and was accepted. After I had been sent out with 
a porter, who had been running three months, to 
show me how to run a car, I was immediately put to 
work. I learned in two trips, according to the report 
my tutor handed to the chief clerk, and by chance 
fell into one of the best runs to New York on one of 
the limited trains during the fair. There was not 
much knocking down on this run, but the tips, 
including the salary were good for three hundred 
dollars per month. I ran on this from September 
first to October fourth and saved three hundred 
dollars. I had not given up getting a Dakota Home- 
stead, for while I was there during the summer I 
learned if I did not draw a number I could buy a 
relinquishment. 

This relates to the purchasing of a relinquish- 
ment: 

An entryman has the right at any time to re- 
linquish back to the United States all his right, title, 
and interest to and in the land covered by his filing. 
The land is then open to entry. 

A claimholder who has filed on a quarter of land 
will have plenty of opportunity to relinquish his 
claim, for a cash consideration, so that another 
party may get a filing on it. This is called buying 
or selling a relinquishment. The amount of the 
consideration varies with quality of the land, and 
the eagerness of the buyer or seller, as the case may be. 



60 The Conquest 

Relinquishments are the largest stock in trade 
of all the real estate dealers, in a new country. 
Besides, everybody from the bank president down 
to the humble dish washer in the hotel, or the chore 
boy in the livery, the ministers not omitted, would, 
with guarded secrecy, confide in you of some choice 
relinquishment that could be had at a very low 
figure compared with what it was really worth. 




The Conquest 61 

CHAPTER VII 

ORISTOWN, THE ''LITTLE CROW" RESERVATION 

HEN I left St. Louis on the night of 
October fourth I headed for Oristown to 
buy someone's relinquishment. I had 
two thousand, five hundred dollars. From 
Omaha the journey was made on the C. & R. W/s 
one train a day that during these times was loaded 
from end to end, with everybody discussing the 
Little Crow and the buying of relinquishments. 
I was the only negro on the train and an object of 
many inquiries as to where I was going. Some of 
those whom I told that I was going to buy a re- 
linquishment seemingly regarded it as a joke, judg- 
ing from the meaning glances cast at those nearest 
them. 

An incident occurred when I arrived at Oristown 
which is yet considered a good joke on a real estate 
man then located there, by the name of Keeler, 
who was also the United States Commissioner. 
He could not only sell me a relinquishment, but 
could also take my filing. I had a talk with Keeler, 
but as he did not encourage me in my plan to make 
a purchase I went to another firm, a young lawyer 
and a fellow by the name of Slater, who ran a livery 
barn, around the corner. Watkins, the lawyer, 
impressed me as having more ambition than prac- 
tical business qualities. However, Slater took the 
matter up and agreed to take me over the reserva- 
tion and show me some good claims. If I bought, 
the drive was gratis, if not four dollars per day, and 
I accepted his proposition. 



62 TheConquest 

After we had driven a few miles he told me Keeler 
had said to him that he was a fool to waste his 
time hauling a d — nigger around over the reserva- 
tion; that I didn't have any money and was just 
"stalling." I flushed angrily, and said "Show me 
what I want and I will produce the money. What 
I want is something near the west end of the county. 
You say the relinquishments are cheaper there and 
the soil is richer. I don't want big hills or rocks 
nor anything I can't farm, but I want a nice level 
or gently rolling quarter section of prairie near 
some town to be, that has prospects of getting the 
railroad when it is extended west from Oristown." 
By this time we had covered the three miles be- 
tween Oristown and the reservation line, and had 
entered the newly opened section which stretched 
for thirty miles to the west. As we drove on I 
became attracted by the long grass, now dead, which 
was of a brownish hue and as I gazed over the miles 
of it lying like a mighty carpet I could seem to feel 
the magnitude of the development and industry 
that would some day replace this state of wildness. 
To the Northeast the Missouri River wound its 
way, into which empties the Whetstone Creek, the 
breaks of which resembled miniature mountains, 
falling abruptly, then rising to a point where the 
dark shale sides glistened in the sunlight. It was 
my longest drive in a buggy. We could go for 
perhaps three or four miles on a table-like plateau, 
then drop suddenly into small canyon-like ditches 
and rise abruptly to the other side. After driving 
about fifteen miles we came to the town, as they 
called it, but I would have said village of Hedrick 



The Conquest 63 

— a collection of frame shacks with one or two houses, 
many roughly constructed sod buildings, the long 
brown grass hanging from between the sod, giving 
it a frizzled appearance. Here we listened to a 
few boosters and mountebanks whose rustic elo- 
quence was no doubt intended to give the unwary 
the impression that they were on the site of the com- 
ing metropolis of the west. A county-seat battle 
was to be fought the next month and the few citizens 
of the sixty days declared they would wrest it from 
Fairview, the present county seat situated in the 
extreme east end of the county, if it cost them a 
million dollars, or one-half of all they were worth. 
They boasted of Hedrick's prospects, sweeping their 
arms around in eloquent gestures in alluding to the 
territory tributary to the town, as though half the 
universe were Hedrick territory. 

Nine miles northwest, where the land was very 
sandy and full of pits, into which the buggy wheels 
dropped with a grinding sound, and where magnesia 
rock cropped out of the soil, was another budding 
town by the name of Kirk. The few prospective 
citizens of this burg were not so enthusiastic as 
those in Hedrick and when I asked one why they 
located the town in such a sandy country he opened 
up with a snort about some pinheaded engineer for 
the "guvment" who didn't know enough to jump 
straight up "a locating the town in such an all 
fired sandy place"; but he concluded with a com- 
pliment, that plenty of good water could be found 
at from fifteen to fifty feet. 

This sandy land continued some three miles west 
and we often found springs along the streams. 



64 TheConquest 

After ascending an unusually steep hill, we came 
upon a plateau where the grass, the soil, and the 
lay of the land, were entirely different from any we 
had as yet seen. I was struck by the beauty of the 
scenery and it seemed to charm and bring me out 
of the spirit of depression the sandy stretch brought 
upon me. Stretching for miles to the northwest 
and to the south, the land would rise in a gentle 
slope to a hog back, and as gently slope away to a 
draw, which drained to the south. Here the small 
streams emptied into a larger one, winding along 
like a snake's track, and thickly wooded with a 
growth of small hardwood timber. It was beautiful. 
From each side the land rose gently like huge wings, 
and spread away as far as the eye could reach. 
The driver brought me back to earth, after a mile 
of such fascinating observations, and pointing to 
the north, said: "There lays one of the claims." 
I was carried away by the first sight of it. The land 
appeared to slope from a point, or table, and to the 
north of that was a small draw, with water. We 
rode along the south side and on coming upon a 
slight raise, which he informed me was the highest 
part of the place, we found a square white stone 
set equally distant from four small holes, four or 
five feet apart. On one side of the stone was in- 
scribed a row of letters which ran like this, SWC, 
SWQ, Sec. 29-97-72 W. 5th P. M., and on the other 
sides were some other letters similar to these. 
"What does all that mean?" I asked. He said 
the letters were initials describing the land and 
reading from the side next to the place we had come 
to see it, read: "The southwest corner of the south- 



TheConquest 65 

west quarter of section twenty-nine, township 
ninety-seven, and range seventy-two, west of the 
fifth principal meridian/ ' 

When we got back to Oristown I concluded I 
wanted the place and dreamed of it that night. It 
had been drawn by a girl who lived with her parents 
across the Missouri. To see her, we had to drive 
to their home, and here a disagreement arose, which 
for a time threatened to cause a split. I had been 
so enthusiastic over the place, that Slater figured on 
a handsome commission, but I had been making 
inquiries in Oristown, and found I could buy re- 
linquishments much cheaper than I had anticipated. 
I had expected the price to be about one thousand, 
eight hundred dollars and came prepared to pay 
that much, but was advised to pay not over five 
hundred dollars for land as far west as the town of 
Megory, which was only four miles northwest of 
the place I was now dickering to buy. We had 
agreed to give the girl three hundred and seventy-five 
dollars, and I had partly agreed to give Slater two 
hundred dollars commission. However, I decided 
this was too much, and told him I would give him 
only seventy-five dollars. He was in for going 
right back to Oristown and calling the deal off, but 
when he figured up that two and a half day's driving; 
would amount to only ten dollars, he offered to take 
one hundred dollars. But I was obstinate and held 
out for seventy-five dollars, finally giving him 
eighty dollars, and in due time became the proud 
owner of a Little Crow homestead. 

All this time I had been writing to Jessie. I had 
written first while I was in Eaton, and she had 
5 



66 TheConquest 

answered in the same demure manner in which she 
had received me at our first meeting, and had con- 
tinued answering the letters I had written from all 
parts of the continent, in much the same way. 
For a time I had quit writing, for I felt that she was 
really too young and not taking me seriously enough, 
but after a month, my sister wrote me, asking why 
I did not write to Jessie; that she asked about me 
every day. This inspired me with a new interest and 
I began writing again. 

I wrote her in glowing terms all about my advent 
in Dakota, and as she was of a reserved disposition, 
I always asked her opinion as to whether she thought 
it a sensible move. I wanted to hear her say some- 
thing more than: "I was at a cantata last evening 
and had a nice time", and so on. Furthermore, 
I was skeptical. I knew that a great many colored 
people considered farming a deprivation of all things 
essential to a good time. In fact, to have a good 
time, was the first thing to be considered, and every- 
thing else was secondary. Jessie, however, was not 
of this kind. She wrote me a letter that surprised 
me, stating, among other things, that she was seven- 
teen and in her senior year high school. That she 
thought I was grand and noble, as well as practical, 
and was sorry she couldn't find words to tell me 
all she felt, but that which satisfied me suited her 
also. I was delighted with her answer and wrote 
a cheerful letter in return, saying I would come to 
see her, Christmas. 




TheConquest 67 

CHAPTER VIII 

FAR DOWN THE PACIFIC— THE PROPOSAL 

|FTER the presidential election of that 
year I went to South America with a 
special party, consisting mostly of New 
York capitalists and millionaires. We 
traveled through the southwest, crossing the Rio 
Grand at Eagle Pass, and on south by the way of 
Toreon, Zacatecas, Aguas Calientes, Guadalajara, 
Puebla, Tehauntepec and to the southwest coast, 
sailing from Salina Cruz down the Pacific to Val- 
paraiso, Chile, going inland to Santiago, thence 
over the Trans-Andean railway across the Andes, 
and onward to the western plateau of Argentina. 

Arriving at the new city of Mendoza, we visited 
the ruins of the ancient city of the same name. 
Here, in the early part of the fifteenth century, on a 
Sunday morning, when a large part of the people 
were at church, an earthquake shook the city. 
When it passed, it left bitter ruin in its wake, the 
only part that stood intact being one wall of the 
church. Of a population of thirteen thousand, 
only sixteen hundred persons escaped alive. The 
city was rebuilt later, and at the time we were there 
it was a beautiful place of about twenty-five thou- 
sand population. At this place a report of bubonic 
plague, in Brazil, reached us. The party became 
frightened and beat it in post haste back to Valpa- 
raiso, setting sail immediately for Salina Cruz, 
and spent the time that was scheduled for a tour 
of Argentina, in snoopin' around the land of the 



68 TheConquest 

Montezumas. This is the American center of 
Catholic Churches; the home of many gaudy 
Spanish women and begging peons; where the people, 
the laws, and the customs, are two hundred years 
behind those of the United States. Still, I thought 
Mexico very beautiful, as well as of historical in- 
terest. 

One day we journeyed far into the highlands, 
where lay the ancient Mexican city of Cuernavaca, 
the one time summer home of America's only Em- 
perior, Maximilian. From there we went to Puebla, 
where we saw the old Cathedral which was begun 
in 1518, and which at that time was said to be the 
second largest in the world. We saw San Louis 
Potosi, and Monterey, and returned by the way of 
Loredo, Texas. I became well enough acquainted 
with the liberal millionaires and so useful in serving 
their families that I made five hundred and seventy- 
five dollars on the trip, besides bringing back so 
many gifts and curiosities of all kinds that I had 
enough to divide up with a good many of my friends. 

Flushed with prosperity and success in my under- 
takings since leaving Southern Illinois less than three 
years before, I went to M — boro to see my sister 
and to see whether Miss Rooks had grown any. 
I was received as a personage of much importance 
among the colored people of the town, who were 
about the same kind that lived in M — pis; not 
very progressive, excepting with their tongues 
when it came to curiosity and gossip. I arrived in 
the evening too late to call on Miss Rooks and 
having become quite anxious to see her again, the 
night dragged slowly away, and I thought the con- 



TheConquest 69 

ventional afternoon would never come again. Her 
father, who was an important figure among the 
colored people, was a mail carrier and brought the 
mail to the house that morning where I stopped. 
He looked me over searchingly, and I tried to ap- 
pear unaffected by his scrutinizing glances. 

By and by two o'clock finally arrived, and with 
my sister I went to make my first call in three years. 
I had grown quite tall and rugged, and I was anxious 
to see how she looked. We were received by her 
mother who said: "Jessie saw you coming and will 
be out shortly/' After a while she entered and how 
she had changed. She, too, had grown much 
taller and was a little stooped in the shoulders. 
She was neatly dressed and wore her hair done up 
in a small knot, in keeping with the style of that 
time. She came straight to me, extended her hand 
and seemed delighted to see me after the years of 
separation. 

After awhile her mother and my sister accom- 
modatingly found an excuse to go up town, and a 
few minutes later with her on the settee beside me, 
I was telling of my big plans and the air castles I 
was building on the great plains of the west. Finally, 
drawing her hand into mine and finding that she 
offered no resistance, I put my arm around her 
waist, drew her close and declared I loved her. 
Then I caught myself and dared not go farther with 
so serious a subject when I recalled the wild, rough, 
and lonely place out on the plains that I had selected 
as a home, and finally asked that we defer anything 
further until the claim on the Little Crow should 
develop into something more like an Illinois home. 



70 The Conquest 

"0, we don't know what will happen before that 
time" she spoke for the first time, with a blush as 
I squeezed her hand. 

''But nothing can happen/' I defended, non- 
plused, "can there?" 

"Well, no," she answered hesitatingly, leaning 
away. 

"Then we will, won't we?" I urged. 

"Well, yes", she answered, looking down and 
appearing a trifle doubtful. I admired her the more. 
Love is something I had longed for more than any- 
thing else, but my ambition to overcome the vagaries 
of my race by accomplishing something worthy 
of note, hadn't given me much time to seek love. 

I went to my old occupation of the road for awhile 
and spent most of the winter on a run to Florida, 
where the tipping was as good as it had been on the 
run from St. Louis to New York. However, about 
a month before I quit I was assigned to a run to 
Boston. By this time I had seen nearly all the 
important cities in the United States and of them 
all none interested me so much as Boston. 

What always appeared odd to me, however, was 
the fact that the passenger yards were right at the 
door of the fashionable Back Bay district on Hunt- 
ington Avenue, near the Hotel Nottingham, not 
three blocks from where the intersection of Hunting- 
ton Avenue and Boylton Street form an acute angle 
in which stands the Public Library, and in the op- 
posite angle stands Trinity Church, so thickly 
purpled with aristocracy and the memory big with 
the tradition of Philip Brooks, the last of that group 
of mighty American pulpit orators, of whom I had 



TheConquest 71 

read so much. A little farther on stands the 
Massachusetts Institute of Technology. 

The mornings I spent wandering around the city, 
visiting Faneuil Hall, the old State House, Boston 
commons, Bunker Hill, and a thousand other re- 
minders of the early heroism, rugged courage, and 
far seeing greatness of Boston's early citizens. 
Afternoons generally found me on Tremont or 
Washington Street attending a matinee or hearing 
music. There once I heard Caruso, Melba, and two 
or three other grand opera stars in the popular 
Rigeletto Quartette, and another time I witnessed 
"Siberia" and the gorgeous and blood-curdling 
reproduction of the Kishneff Massacre, with two 
hundred people on the stage. On my last trip to 
Boston I saw Chauncy Olcott in "Terrence the 
Coach Boy", a romance of old Ireland with the 
scene laid in Valley Bay, which seemed to correspond 
to the Back Bay a few blocks away. 

Dear old Boston, when will I see you again, was 
my thought as the train pulled out through the 
most fashionable part of America, so stately and 
so grand. Even now I recall the last trip with a 
sigh. If the Little Crow, with Oristown as its 
gateway, was a land of hope; through Massachu- 
setts; Worcester, with the Polytechnic Institute 
arising in the back ground; Springfield, and Smith 
School for girls, Pittsfield, Brookfield, and on to 
Albany on the Hudson, is a memory never to be 
forgotten, which evolved in my mind many long 
years afterward, in my shack on the homestead. 




72 TheConquest 

CHAPTER IX 

THE RETURN— ERNEST NICHOLSON 

LEFT St. Louis about April first with 
about three thousand dollars in the bank 
and started again for Oristown, this 
time to stay. I had just paid Jessie a 
visit and I felt a little lonely. With the grim reality 
of the situation facing me, I now began to steel my 
nerves for a lot of new experience which soon came 
thick and fast. 

Slater met the train at Oristown, and as soon as 
he spied me he informed me that I was a lucky man. 
That a town had been started ajoining my land and 
was being promoted by his brother and the sons of 
a former Iowa Governor, and gave every promise 
of making a good town, also, if I cared to sell, he 
had a buyer who was willing to pay me a neat 
advance over what I had paid. However, I had 
no idea of parting with the land, but I was delighted 
over the news, and the next morning found me 
among Dad Durpee's through stage coach pas- 
sengers, for Calias, the new town joining my home- 
stead, via Hedrick and Kirk. As we passed through 
Hedrick I noticed that several frame shacks had 
been put up and some better buildings were under 
way. The ground had been frozen for five months, 
so sod-house building had been temporarily aban- 
doned. 

It was a long ride, but I was beside myself with 
enthusiasm. Calias finally loomed up, conspicu- 
ously perched on a hill, and could be seen long before 



TheConquest 73 

# 
the stage arrived, and was the scene of much activity 
It had been reported that a colored man had a claim 
adjoining the town on the north, so when I stepped 
from the stage before the postoffice, the many- 
knowing glances informed me that I was being looked 
for. A fellow who had a claim near and whom I 
met in Oristown, introduced me to the Postmaster 
whose name was Billinger, an individual with dry 
complexion and thin, light hair. Then to the presi- 
dent of the Townsite Company, second of three 
sons of the Iowa Governor. 

My long experience with all classes of humanity 
had made me somewhat of a student of human 
nature, and I could see at a glance that here was a 
person of unusual agressiveness and great capacity 
for doing things. As he looked at me his eyes 
seemed to bore clear through, and as he asked a few 
questions his searching look would make a person 
tell the truth whether he would or no. This was 
Ernest Nicholson, and in the following years he 
had much to do with the development of the Little 
Crow. 



US 


Tj 



74 TheConquest 

CHAPTER X 

THE OKLAHOMA GRAFTER 

HAT evening at the hotel he asked me 
whether I wished to double my money 
by selling my relinquishment. "No," 
I answered, "but I tell you what I do 
want to do," I replied firmly. "I am not here to 
sell; I am here to make good or die trying; I am here 
to grow up- with this country and prosper with the 
growth, if possible. I have a little coin back in old 
"Chi." (my money was still in the Chicago bank) 
"and when these people begin to commute and want 
to sell, I am ready to buy another place." I admired 
the fellow. He reminded me of "the richest man in 
the world" in "The Lion and the Mouse," Otis 
Skinner as Colonel Phillippi Bridau, an officer on the 
staff of Napoleon's Army in "The Honor of the 
Family", and other characters in plays that I greatly 
admired, where great courage, strength of character, 
and firm decision were displayed. He seemed to 
have a commanding way that one found himself 
feeling honored and willing to obey. 

But getting back to the homestead. I looked 
over my claim and found it just as I had left it the 
fall before, excepting that a prairie fire during the 
winter had burned the grass. The next morning 
I returned to Oristown and announced my intentions 
of buying a team. The same day I drew a draft 
for five hundred dollars with which to start. 

Now if there is anywhere an inexperienced man is 
sure to go wrong in starting up on a homestead, it is 



TheConquest 75 

in buying horses. Most prospective homesteaders 
make the same mistake I did in buying horses, unless 
they are experienced. The inefficient man reasons 
thus: ''Well, I will start off economically by buy- 
ing a cheap team" — and he usually gets what he 
thought he wanted, "a cheap team." 

If I had gone into the country and bought a team 
of young mares for say three hundred dollars, which 
would have been a very high price at that time, I 
would have them yet, and the increase would have 
kept me fairly well supplied with young horses, 
instead of scouting around town looking for some- 
thing cheaper, in the "skate" line, as I did. I 
looked at so many teams around Oristown that all 
of them began to look alike. I am sure I must have 
looked at five hundred different horses, more in an 
effort to appear as a conservative buyer than to 
buy the best team. Finally 1 ran onto an " Okla- 
homa" grafter by the name of Numemaker. 

He was a deceiving and unscrupulous rascal, but 
nevertheless possessed a pleasing personality, which 
stood him in good in his schemes of deception, and 
we became quite chummy. He professed to know 
all about horses — no doubt he did, but he didn't 
put his knowledge at my disposal in the way I 
thought he should, being a friend, as he claimed. 
He finally persuaded me to buy a team of big 
plugs, one of which was so awkward he looked as 
though he would fall down if he tried to trot. 
The other was a powerful four-year-old gelding, that 
would have never been for sale around Oristown if 
it hadn't been that he had two feet badly wire cut. 
One was so very large that it must have been quite 



76 The Conquest 

burdensome for the horse to pick it up, swing it 
forward and put it down, as I look back and see 
him now in my mind. 

When I was paying the man for them I wondered 
why Nunemaker led him into the private office of 
the bank, but I was not left long in doubt. When 
I crossed the street one of the men who had tried 
to sell me a team jumped me with: "Well, they got 
you, did they ?" his voice mingled with sarcasm and 
a sneer. 

"Got who?" I returned questionly. 

"Does a man have to knock you down to take 
a hint?" he went on in a tone of disappointment 
and anger. Don't you know that man Nunemaker 
is the biggest grafter in Oristown? I would have 
sold you that team of mine for twenty-five dollars 
less'n I offered 'em, if the gol-darn grafter hadn't 
of come to me'n said, 'give me twenty-five dollars 
and I will see that the coon buys the team.' I 
would have knocked him down with a club if I'd 
had one, the low life bum." He finished with a 
snort and off he went. 

"Stung, by cracky," was all I could say, and feel- 
ing rather blue I went to the barn where the team 
was, stroked them and hoped for the best. 

I then bought lumber to build a small house and 
barn, an old wagon for twenty dollars, one wheel 
of which the blacksmith had forgotten to grease, 
worked hard all day getting loaded, and wearied, 
sick and discouraged, I started at five o'clock P. M. 
to drive the thirty miles to Calias. When I was 
out two miles the big old horse was wobbling along 
like a broken-legged cow, hobbling, stumbling, and 



The Conquest 77 

making such a burdensome job of walking, that I 
felt like doing something desperate. When I 
looked back the wheel that had not been greased 
was smoking like a hot box on the Twentieth 
Century Limited. 

The sun was nearly down and a cold east wind 
was whooping it up at about sixty miles an hour, 
chilling me to the marrow. The fact that I was a 
stranger in a strange land, inhabited wholly by 
people not my own race, did not tend to cheer my 
gloomy spirits. I decided it might be all right in 
July but never in April. I pulled my wagon to the 
side of the road, got down and unhitched and 
jumped on the young horse, and such a commotion 
as he did make. I am quite sure he would have 
bucked me off, had it not for his big foot being so 
heavy, he couldn't raise it quick enough to leap. 
Evidently he had never been ridden. When I got 
back to Oristown and put the team in the barn and 
warmed up, I resolved to do one thing and do it 
that night. I would sell the old horse, and I did, 
for twenty-two-fifty. I considered myself lucky, 
too. I had paid one hundred and ninety dollars 
for the team and harness the day before. 

I sat down and wrote Jessie a long letter, telling 
her of my troubles and that I was awfully, awfully, 
lonesome. There was only one other colored person 
in the town, a barber who was married to a white 
woman, and I didn't like him. 

The next day I hired a horse, started early and 
arrived at Calias in good time. At Hedrick I hired 
a sod mason, who was also a carpenter, at three 
dollars a day and we soon put up a^frame barn 



78 TheConquest 

large enough for three horses; a sod house sixteen 
by fourteen with a hip roof made of two by fours for 
rafters, and plain boards with tar paper and sod 
with the grass turned downward and laid side by 
side, the cracks being filled with sand. The house 
had two small windows and one door, that was a 
little short on account of my getting tired carrying 
sod. I ordered the " contractor' ' to put the roof 
on as soon as I felt it was high enough to be 
comfortable inside. 

The fifth day I moved in. There was no floor, 
but the thick, short buffalo grass made a neat carpet. 
In one corner I put the bed, while in another I set 
the table, the one next the door I placed the stove, 
a little two-hole burner gasoline, and in the other 
corner I made a bin for the horses grain. 




TheConquest 79 

CHAPTER XI 
dealin' in mules 

\T must have been about the twentieth 
of April when I finished building. I 
started to " batch' ' and prepared to 
break out my claim. Having only 
one horse, it became necessary to buy another team. 
I decided to buy mules this time. I remembered 
that back on our farm in southern Illinois, mules 
were thought to be capable of doing more work than 
horses and eat less grain. So when some boys living 
west of me came one Sunday afternoon, and said 
they could sell me a team of mules, I agreed to go 
and see them the next day. I thought I was getting 
wise. As proof of such wisdom I determined to 
view the mules in the field. I followed them around 
the field a few times and although they were not 
fine looking, they seemed to work very well. An- 
other great advantage was, they were cheap, only 
one hundred and thirty-five dollars for the team 
and a fourteen-inch-rod breaking plow. This 
looked to me like a bargain. I wrote him a check 
and took the mules home with me. Jack and Jenny 
were their names, and I hadn't owned Jack two 
days before I began to hate him. He was lazy, 
and when he went down hill, instead of holding 
his head up and stepping his front feet out, he would 
lower the bean and perform a sort of crow-hop. 
It was too exasperating for words and I used to 
strike him viciously for it, but that didn't seem to 
help matters any. 



80 TheConquest 

I shall not soon forget my first effort to break 
prairie. There are different kinds of plows made for 
breaking the sod. Some kind that are good for 
one kind of soil cannot be used in another. In 
the gummy soils of the Dakotas, a long slant cut 
is the best. In fact, about the only kind that can 
be used successfully, while in the more sandy lands 
found in parts of Kansas and Nebraska, a kind is 
used which is called the square cut. The share 
being almost at right angles with the beam instead 
of slanting back from point to heel. Now in sandy 
soils this pulls much easier for the grit scours off 
any roots, grass, or whatever else would hang over 
the share. To attempt to use this kind in wet, 
sticky land, such as was on my claim, would find 
the soil adhering to the plow share, causing it to 
drag, gather roots and grass, until it is impossible 
to keep the plow in the ground. When it is dry, 
this kind of plow can be used with success in the 
gummy land; but it was not dry when I invaded 
my homestead soil with my big horse, Jenny and 
Jack, that first day of May, but very wet indeed, 

To make matters worse, Doc, the big horse, 
believed in "speeding." Jenny was fair but Jack, 
on the landside, was affected with "hook-worm 
hustle," and believed in taking his time. I tried 
to help him along with a yell that grew louder as 
I hopped, skipped, and jumped across the pairie, 
and that plow began hitting and missing, mostly 
missing. It would gouge into the soil up to the 
beam, and the big horse would get down and make 
a mighty pull, while old Jack would swing back 
like the heavy end of a ball bat when a player 



The Conquest 81 

draws to strike, and out would come the plow with 
a skip, skip, skip; the big horse nearly trotting and 
dragging the two little mules, that looked like two 
goats beside an elephant. Well, I sat down and gave 
up to a fit of the blues; for it looked bad, mighty- 
bad for me. 

I had left St. Louis with two hundred dollars in 
cash, and had drawn a draft for five hundred dollars 
more on the Chicago bank, where my money was 
on deposit, and what did I have for it? One big 
horse, tall as a giraffe; two little mules, one of which 
was a torment to me; a sod house; and old wagon. 
As I faced the situation there seemed nothing to do 
but to fight it out, and I turned wearily to another 
attempt, this time with more success. Before I 
had started breaking I had invited criticism. Now 
I was getting it on all sides. I was the only colored 
homesteader on the reservation, and as an agricul- 
turist it began to look mighty bad for the colored 
race on the Little Crow. 

Finally, with the assistance of dry weather, I 
got the plow so I could go two or three rods without 
stopping, throw it out of the ground and clear the 
share of roots and grass. Sometimes I managed 
to go farther, but never over forty rods, the entire 
summer. 

I took another course in horse trading or mule 
trading, which almost came to be my undoing. I 
determined to get rid of Jack. I decided that I 
would not be aggravated with his laziness and crow- 
hopping any longer than it took me to find a trade. 
So on a Sunday, about two weeks after I bought 
the team, a horse trader pulled into Calias, drew 

6 



82 The Conquest 

his prairie schooner to a level spot, hobbled his horses 
— mostly old plugs of diverse descriptions, and made 
preparation to stay awhile. He had only one 
animal, according to my horse-sense (?), that was 
any good, and that was a mule that he kept 
blanketed. His camp was so situated that I could 
watch the mule, from my east window, and the more 
I looked at the mule, the better he looked to me. 
It was Wednesday noon the following week and old 
Jack had become almost unbearable. My con- 
tinuing to watch a good mule do nothing, while 
I continued to fret my life away trying to be patient 
with a lazy brute, only added to my restlessness and 
eagerness to trade. At noon I entered the barn 
and told old Jack I would get rid of him. I would 
swap him to that horse trader for his good mule 
as soon as I watered him. He was looking pretty 
thin and I thought it would be to my advantage 
to fill him up. 

During the three days the trader camped near 
my house he never approached me with an offer 
to sell or trade, and it was with many misgivings 
that I called out in a loud, breezy voice and David 
Harum manner; "Hello, Governor, how will you 
trade mules?" "How'll I trade mules? did you 
say how'U I trade mules? Huh, do you suppose I 
want your old mule?" drawing up one side of his 
face and twisting his big red nose until he resembled 
a German clown. 

"0, my mule's fair", I defended weakly. 

11 Nothing but an old dead mule," he spit out, 
grabbing old Jack's tail and giving him a yank that 
all but pulled him over. "Look at him, look at him," 



TheConquest 83 

he rattled away like an auctioneer. "Go on, Mr. 
Colored Man, you can't work me that way." He 
continued stepping around old Jack, making pre- 
tentions to hit him on the head. Jack may have 
been slow in the field, but he was swift in dodging, 
and he didn't look where he dodged either. I was 
standing at his side holding the reins, when the 
fellow made one of his wild motions, and Jack nearly 
knocked my head off as he dodged. "Nawsir, if I 
considered a trade, that is if I considered a trade 
at all, I would have to have a lot of boot" he said 
with an important air. 

"How much?" I asked nervously. 

"Well, sir", he spoke with slow decision; "I would 
have to have twenty-five dollars." 

"What!" I exclaimed, at which he seemed to 
weaken; but he didn't understand that my excla- 
mation was of surprise that he only wanted twenty- 
five dollars, when I had expceted to give him seventy- 
five dollars. I grasped the situation, however, and 
leaning forward, said hardly above a whisper, my 
heart was so near my throat: "I will give you 
twenty," as I pulled out my roll and held a twen y 
before his eyes, which he took as though afraid I 
would jerk it away; muttering something about it 
not being enough, and that he had ought to have had 
twenty-five. However, he got old Jack and the 
twenty, gathered his plugs and left town immed- 
iately. I felt rather proud of my new possession, 
but before I got through the field that afternoon I 
became suspicious. Although I looked my new 
mule over and over often during the afternoon while 
plowing, I could find nothing wrong. Still I had 



84 TheConquest 

a chilly premonition, fostered, no doubt, by past 
experience, that something would show up soon, 
and in a few days it did show up. I learned 
afterward the trader had come thirty-five miles to 
trade me that mule. 

The mule I had traded was only lazy, while the 
one I had received in the trade was not only lazy, 
but " ornery" and full of tricks that she took a 
fiendish delight in exercising on me. One of her 
favorites was to watch me out of her left eye, 
shirking the while, and crowding the furrow at the 
same time, which would pull the plow out of the 
ground. I tried to coax and cajole her into doing 
a decent mule's work, but it availed me nothing. 
I bore up under the aggravation with patience and 
fortitude, then determined to subdue the mule or 
become subdued myself. I would lunge forward 
with my whip, and away she would rush out from 
under it, brush the other horse and mule out of 
their places and throw things into general confusion. 
Then as soon as I was again straightened out, she 
would be back at her old tricks, and I am almost 
positive that she used to wink at me impudently 
from her vantage point. Added to this, the coloring 
matter with which the trader doped her head, faded, 
and she turned grey headed in two weeks, leaving 
me with a mule of uncertain and doubtful age, in- 
stead of one of seven going on eight as the trader 
represented her to be. 

I soon had the enviable reputation of being a horse 
trader. Whenever anybody with horses to trade 
came to town, they were advised to go over to the 
sod house north of town and see the colored man. 



The Conquest 85 

He was fond of trading horses, yes, he fairly doted 
on it. Nevertheless with all my poor " horse- 
judgment" I continued to turn the sod over day 
after day and completed ten or twelve acres each 
week. 




86 TheConquest 

CHAPTER XII 

THE HOMESTEADERS 

j|F neighbors, I had many. There was 
Miss Carter from old Missouri whose 
claim joined mine on the west, and an- 
other Missourian to the north of her; a 
loud talking German north of him, and an English 
preacher to the east of the German. A traveling 
man's family lived north of me; and a big, fat, lazy 
barber who seemed to be taking the "rest cure," 
joined me on the east. His name was Starks and 
he had drawn number 252. He had a nice, level 
claim with only a few buffalo wallows to detract 
from its value, and he held the distinction of being 
the most uncompromisingly lazy man on the Little 
Crow. This, coupled with the unpardonable 
fault of complaining about everything, made him 
nigh unbearable and he was known as the "Beefer." 
He came from a small town, usually the home of 
his ilk, in Iowa, where he had a small shop and owned 
three and a half acres of garden and orchard ground 
on the outskirts of the town. He would take a 
fiendish delight in relating and re-relating how the 
folks in his house back in Iowa were having straw- 
berries, new peas, green beans, spring onions, and 
enjoying all the fruits of a tropical climate, while he 
was holding down an "infernal no-account claim" 
on the Little Crow, and eating out of a can. 

A merchant was holding down a claim south of 
him, and a banker lived south of the merchant. 
Thus it was a varied class of homesteaders around 



TheConquest 87 

Calias and Megory, the first summer on the Little 
Crow. Only about one in every eight or ten was 
a farmer. They were of all vocations in life and 
all nationalities, excepting negroes, and I controlled 
the colored vote. 

This was one place where being a colored man was 
an honorary distinction. I remember how I once 
requested the stage driver to bring me some meat 
from Megory, there being no meat shop in Calias, 
and it was to be left at the post office. Apparently 
I had failed to give the stage driver my name, for 
when I called for it, it was handed out to me, done 
up in a neat package, and addressed "Colored Man, 
Calias." My neighbors soon learned, however, 
that my given name was "Oscar," but it was some 
time before they could all spell or pronounce the 
odd surname. 

During the month of June it rained twenty-three 
days, but I was so determined to break out one 
hundred and twenty acres, that after a few days 
of the rainy weather I went out and worked in the 
rain. Starks used to go up town about four o'clock 
for the mail, wearing a long, yellow slicker, and when 
he saw me going around the half-mile land he re- 
marked to the bystanders: "Just look at that fool 
nigger a working in the rain." 

Being the first year of settlement in a new country, 
there naturally was no hay to buy, so the settlers 
turned their stock out to graze, and many valuable 
horses strayed away and were lost. When it rained 
so much and the weather turned so warm, the mos- 
quitoes filled the air and covered the earth and 
attacked everything in their path. When I turned 



88 The Conquest 

my horses out after the day's work was done, they 
soon found their way to town, where they stood in 
the shelter of some buildings and fought mos- 
quitoes. Their favorite place for this pastime was 
the post office, where Billinger had a shed awning 
over the board walk, the framework consisting of 
two-by-fours joined together and nailed lightly to 
the building, and on top of this he had laid a few 
rough boards. Under this crude shelter the home- 
steaders found relief from the broiling afternoon sun, 
and swapped news concerning the latest offer for 
their claims. The mosquitoes did not bother so 
much in even so slight an inclosure as this, so every 
night Jenny Mule would walk on to the board 
walk, prick up her ears and look in at the window. 
About this time the big horse would come along 
and begin to scratch his neck on one of the two-by- 
fours, and suddenly down would go Billinger's port- 
able awning with a loud crash which was augmented 
by Jenny Mule getting out from under the falling 
boards. As the sound echoed through the slumber- 
ing village the big horse would rush away to the 
middle of the street, with a prolonged snort, and won- 
der what it was all about. This was the story 
Billinger told when I came around the next morning 
to drive them home from the storekeeper's oat bin 
where they had indulged in a midnight lunch. The 
performance was repeated nightly and got brother 
Billinger out of bed at all hours. He swore by 
all the Gods of Buddha and the people of South 
Dakota, that he would put the beasts up and charge 
me a dollar to get them. 

Early one morning I came over and found that 
Billinger had remained true to his oath, and the 



The Conquest 89 

horse and mule were tied to a wagon belonging to 
the storekeeper. Nearby on a pile of rock sat 
Billinger, nodding away, sound asleep. I quietly 
untied the rope from the wagon and peaceably led 
them home. Then Billinger was in a rage. He 
had a small, screechy tremulo voice and it fairly 
sputtered as he tiraded: "If it don't beat all; I never 
saw the like. I was up all last night chasing those 
darned horses, caught them and tied them up; and 
along comes Devereaux while I am asleep and 
takes horses, rope and all." The crowd roared 
and Billinger decided the joke was on him. 

Miss Carter, my neighbor on the west, had her 
trouble too. One day she came by, distressed and 
almost on the verge of tears, and burst out: "Oh, 
Oh, Oh, I hardly know what to do." 

I could never bear seeing any one in such distress 
and I became touched by her grief. Upon becoming 
more calm, she told me: "The banker says that the 
man who is breaking prairie on my claim is ruining 
the ground." She was simply heart-broken about it, 
and off she went into another spasm of distress. 
I saw the fellow wasn't laying the sod over smoothly 
because he had a sixteen-inch plow, and had it 
set to cut only about eight inches, which caused 
the sod to push away and pile up on edges, instead 
of turning and dropping into the furrow. I went 
with her and explained to the fellow where the 
fault lay. The next day he was doing a much better 
job. 

Those who have always lived in the older settled 
parts of the country sometimes have exagge ated 
ideas of life on the homestead, and the following 



90 TheConquest 

incident offers a partial explanation. Megory and 
Caliaseach had a newspaper, and when they weren't 
roasting each other and claiming their paper to be 
the only live and progressive organ in the country, 
they were " building' ' railroads or printing romatic 
tales about the brave homesteader girls. A little 
red-headed girl nicknamed "Jack" owned a claim 
near Calias. One day it was reported that she 
killed a rattlesnake in her house. The report of 
the great encounter reached eastern dailies, and 
was published as a Sunday feature story in one of 
the leading Omaha papers. It was accompanied 
by gorgeous pictures of the girl in a leather skirt, 
riding boots, and cow-boy hat, entering a sod house, 
and before her, coiled and poised to strike, lay a 
monster rattlesnake. Turning on her heel and 
jerking the bridle from her horse's head, she made 
a terrific swing at Mr. Rattlesnake, and he, of course, 
"met his Waterloo." This, so the story read, was 
the eightieth rattlesnake she had killed. She was 
described as "rattlesnake Jack" and thereafter went 
by that name. She was also credited with having 
spent the previous winter alone on her claim and 
rather enjoyed the wintry nights and snow blockade. 
Now as a matter of fact, she had spent most of the 
previous winter enjoying the comforts of a front 
room at the Hotel Calias, going to the claim oc- 
casionally on nice days. She had no horse, and as 
to the eighty rattlesnakes, seventy-nine were myths, 
existing only in the mind of a prolific feature story 
writer for the Sunday edition of the great dailies. 
In fact she had killed one small young rattler with 
a button. 




TheConquest 91 

CHAPTER XIII 

IMAGINATIONS RUN AMUCK 

DECIDED to utilize some of my spare 
time by doing a little freighting from 
Oristown to Calias. Accordingly, one 
fair morning I started for the former 
town. It began raining that evening, finally turn- 
ing into a fine snow, and by morning a genuine 
South Dakota blizzard was raging. How the wind 
did screech across the prairie! 

I was driving the big horse and Jenny Mule to 
a wagon loaded with two tons of coal. They were 
not shod, and the hillsides had become slick and 
treacherous with ice. At the foot of very hill 
Jenny Mule would lay her ears back, draw herself 
up like a toad, when teased, and look up with a 
groan, while the big horse trotted on up the next 
slope, pulling her share of the load. 

When the wind finally went down the mercury 
fell to 25° below zero and my wrists, face, feet, 
and ears were frost bitten when I arrived at 
Calias. As is always the case during such severe 
weather, the hotel was filled, and laughing, story 
telling, and good cheer prevailed. The Nicholson 
boys asked "how I made it" and I answered 
disgustedly that I'd have made it all right if that 
Jennie Mule hadn't got faint hearted. The re- 
mark was received as a good joke and my suffering 
and annoyances of the trip slipped away into the 
past. That remark also had the further effect of 
giving Jennie Mule immortality. She became the 



92 TheConquest 

topic of conversation and jest in hotel and postoffice 
lobbies, and even to this day the story of the " faint 
hearted mule" often affords splendid entertainment 
at festive boards and banquet halls of the Little 
Crow, when told by a Nicholson. 

While working in the rain, the perspiration and 
the rain water had caused my body to become so 
badly galled, that I found considerable difficulty 
in getting around. To add to this discomfiture 
Jenny Mule was affected with a touch of 
"Maudism" at times, especially while engaged in 
eating grain. One night when I had wandered 
thoughtlessly into the barn, she gave me such a 
wallop on the right shin as to impair that member 
until I could hardly walk without something to 
hold to. As it had taken a fourteen-hundred-mile 
walk to follow the plow in breaking the one hundred 
and twenty acres, I was about "all in" physically 
when it was done. 

As a means of recuperation I took a trip to Chi- 
cago. While there, the "call of the road" affected 
me; I got reinstated and ran a couple of months 
to the coast. Four months of free life on the plains, 
however, had changed me. After one trip I came 
in and found a letter from Jessie, saying she was sick, 
and although she never said "come and see me" I 
took it as an excuse and quit that P — n Company 
for good — and here it passes out of the story — went 
down state to M — boro, and spent the happiest 
week of my life. 

After I had returned to Dakota, however, I con- 
tracted an imagination that worked me into a state 
of jealously, concerning an individual who made 



TheConquest 93 

his home in M — boro, and with whom I suspicioned 
the object of my heart to be unduly friendly. I say, 
this is what I suspicioned. There was no particular 
proof, and I have been inclined to think, in after 
years, that it was more a case of an over-energetic 
imagination run amuck. I contended in my mind 
and in my letters to her as well, that I should not 
have thought anything of it, if the " man in the case " 
had a little more promising future, but since his 
proficiency only earned him the munificent sum of 
three dollars per week, I continued to fret and fume, 
until I at last resolved to suspend all communica- 
tion with her. 

Now what I should have done when I reached this 
stage of imaginary insanity, was to have sent Miss 
Rooks a ticket, some money, and she would have 
come to Dakota and married me, and together we 
would have " lived happy ever after/' As I see it 
now, I was affected with an "idealism." Of course 
I was not aware of it at the time — no young soul 
is — until they have learned by bitter experience 
the folly of "they should not do thus and so", and, 
of course, there is the old excuse, "good intentions." 
Somewhere I read that the road to — not St. Peter — 
is paved with good intentions. The result of my 
prolific imagination was that I carried out my reso- 
lutions, quit writing, and emotionally lived rather 
unhappily thereafter, for some time at least. 




94 TheConquest 

CHAPTER XIV 

THE SURVEYORS 

HE entire Little Crow reservation con- 
sisted of about two million acres of land, 
four-fifths of which was unopened and 
lay west of Megory County. Of the 
two million acres, perhaps one million, five hundred 
thousand ranged from fair to the richest of loam 
soil, underlaid with clay. The climatic condition 
is such that all kinds of crops grown in the central 
west, can be grown here. Two hundred miles north, 
corn will not mature; two hundred miles south, 
spring wheat is not grown; two hundred west, the 
altitude is too high to insure sufficient rainfall to 
produce a crop; but the reservation lands are in 
such a position that winter wheat, spring wheat, 
oats, rye, corn, flax, and barley do well. Ever 
since the drouth of '94, all crops had thrived, the 
rainfall being abundant, and continuing so during 
the first year of settlement. Oristown and other 
towns on the route of the railroad had waited 
twenty years for the extension, and now the citizens 
of Oristown estimated it would be at least ten years 
before it extended its line through the reservation; 
while the settlers, to the number of some eight thou- 
sand, hoped they would get the road in five years. 
However, no sleep was lost in anticipation. The 
nearest the reservation came to getting a railroad 
that summer was by the way of a newspaper in 
Megory, whose editor spent most of his time building 
roads into Megory from the north, south, and the 



/ 



TheConquest 95 

east. In reality, the C. & R. W. was the only road 
likely to run to the reservation, and all the towns 
depended on its extension to overcome the long, 
burdensome freighting with teams. 

With all the country's local advantages, its 
geographical location was such as to exclude roads 
from all directions except the one taken by the 
C. & R. W. To the south lay nine million acres 
of worthless sand hills, through which it would 
require an enormous sum of money to build a road. 
Even then there would be miles of track which 
would practically pay no interest on the investment. 
At that time there was no railroad extending the 
full length of the state from east to west, most lines 
stopping at or near the Missouri River. Since then 
two or three lines have been built into the western 
part of the state; but they experienced much 
difficulty in crossing the river, owing to the soft 
bottom, which in many places would not support a 
modern steel bridge. For from one to two months in 
the spring, floating ice gives a great deal of trouble 
and wreaks disaster to the pontoon. 

A bird's eye view of the Little Crow shows it to 
look something like a bottle, the neck being the 
Missouri River, with the C. & R. W. tracks creeping 
along its west bank. This is the only feasible route 
to the Reservation and the directors of this road were 
fully aware of their advantageous position. The 
freight rates from Omaha to Oristown (a distance 
of two hundred and fifty miles) being as high as 
from Omaha to Chicago, a distance of five hundred 
miles. 

But getting back to the settlers around and in 



96 The Conquest 

the little towns on the Little Crow. The first thing 
to be considered in the extension was, that the 
route it took would naturally determine the future 
of the towns. Hedrick, Kirk, and Megory were 
government townsites, strung in a northwesterly 
direction across the country, ranging from eight 
to fifteen miles apart, the last being about five miles 
and a half east of the west line of the county. Now 
the county on the west was expected to be thrown 
open to settlement soon, would likely be opened 
under the lottery system, as was Megory county. 
After matters had settled this began to be discussed, 
particularly by the citizens of Megory, five and one- 
half miles from the Tipp County line. This 
placed Megory in the same position to handle the 
crowds coming into the next county, as Oristown 
had for Megory County, excepting Megory would 
have an advantage, for Tipp County was twice as 
large as Megory. When this was all considered, 
the people of Megory began to boost the town on 
the prospects of a future boom. The only uncertain 
feature of the matter then to be considered was 
which way the road would extend. That was where 
the rub came in, which way would the road go? 
This became a source of continual worry and specu- 
lation on the part of the towns, and the men who felt 
inclined to put money into the towns in the way of 
larger, better, and more commodious buildings; 
but when they were encouraged to do so, there was 
always the bogy "if." If the railroad should miss 
us, well, the man owning the big buildings was 
"stung," that was all, while the man with the shack 
could load it on two or four wagons, and with a 



TheConquest 97 

few good horses, land his buildingTin^the town the 
railroad struck or started. This was, and is yet, 
one of the big reasons shacks are so numerous in 
a town in a new country, which expects a road but 
knows not which way it will come; and the officials 
of the C. & R. W. were no different from the di- 
rectors of any other road. They were "mum" as 
dummies. They wouldn't tell whether the road 
would ever extend or not. 

The Oristown citizens claimed it was at one time 
in the same uncertainty as the towns to the west, 
and for some fifteen or twenty years it had waited 
for the road. With the road stopping at Oristown, 
they argued, it would be fully ten years before it 
left, and during this time it could be seen, Oristown 
whould grow into an important prairie city, as it 
should. Everything must be hauled into Oris- 
town, as well as out. So it can be seen that Oristown 
would naturally boom. While nothing had been 
raised to the west to ship out, as yet, still there was 
a growing population on the reservation and thou- 
sands of carloads of freight and express were being 
hauled into and from Oristown monthly, for the 
settlers on the reservation; which filled the town with 
railroad men and freighters. Crops had been good, 
and every thing was going along smoothly for the 
citizens and property owners of Oristown. Not a 
cloud on her sky of prosperity, and as the trite saying 
goes: " Everything was lovely, and the goose hung 
high," during the first year of settlement on the 
Little Crow. 

And now lest we forget Calias. Calias was lo- 
cated one and one-half miles east, and three miles 

7 



98 TheConq u"e s t 

south of Megory, and five miles straight west of 
Kirk. If the C. & R. W. extending its line west, 
should strike all the government townsites, as was 
claimed by people in these towns, who knew nothing 
about it, and Calias, it would have run from Kirk 
to Megory in a very unusual direction. Indeed, it 
would have been following the section lines and it 
is common knowledge even to the most ignorant, 
that railroads do not follow section lines unless the 
section lines are directly in its path. If the rail- 
road struck Kirk and Megory, it was a cinch it 
would miss Calias. If it struck Calias, perched on 
the banks of the Monca Creek, the route the 
Nicholsons, as promoters of the town, claimed it 
would take; the road would miss all the towns but 
Calias. This would have meant glory and a fortune 
for the promoters and lot holders of the town. It 
would also have meant that my farm, or at least a 
part of it, would in time be sold for town lots. 

After I got so badly overreached in dealing in 
horses, for a time the opinion was general that the 
solitary negro from the plush cushions of a P — n 
would soon see that growing up with a new country 
was not to his liking, and would be glad to sell at 
any old figure and "beat it" back to more ease and 
comfort. This is largely the opinion of most of 
the white people, regarding the negro, and they are 
not entirely wrong in their opinion. I was quite 
well aware that such an opinion existed, but con- 
trary to expectations, I rather appreciated it. When 
I broke out one hundred and twenty acres with 
such an outfit as I had, as against many other real 
farmers who had not broken over forty acres, with 



The Conquest 99 

good horses and their knowledge of breaking prairie, 
acquired in states they had come from, I began to 
be regarded in a different light. At first I was 
regarded as an object of curiosity, which changed 
to appreciation, and later admiration. I was not 
called a free-go-easy coon, but a genuine booster 
for Calias and the Little Crow. I never spent a 
lonesome day after that. 

The Nicholson Brothers, however, gave the set- 
tlers no rest, and created another sensation of rail- 
road building by their new contention that the 
railroad would not be extended from Oristown, but 
that it would be built from a place on the Monca 
bottom two stations below Oristown, where the 
track climbed a four per cent grade to Fairview, 
then on to Oristown. They offered as proof of 
their contention that the C. & R. W. maintained 
considerable yardage there, and it does yet. Why 
it did, people did not know, and this kept everybody 
guessing. Some claimed it would go up the Monca 
Valley, as Nicholson claimed. This much can be 
said in favor of the Nicholsons, they were good 
boosters, or "big liars/' as their rivals called them, 
and if one listened long and diligently enough they 
would have him imagine he could hear the exhaust 
of a big locomotive coming up the Monca Valley. 
While the people in the government townsites per- 
sisted loudly that the C. & R. W. had contracted 
with the government before the towns were located, 
to strike these three towns, and that the government 
had helped to locate them; that furthermore, the 
railroad would never have left the Monca Valley, 
which it followed for some twenty miles after leaving 



100 The Conquest 

the banks of the Missouri. All of which sounded 
reasonable enough, but the government and the 
railroad had entered into no agreement whatever, 
and the people in the government towns knew it, 
and were uneasy. 

I had been on my claim just about a year, when 
one day Rattlesnake Jack's father came from 
his home on the Jim River and sold me her home- 
stead for three thousand dollars. My dreams were 
at last realized, and I had become the owner of 
three hundred and twenty acres of land; but my 
money was now gone, when I had paid the one 
thousand, five hundred dollars down on the Rattle 
Snake Jack place, giving her back a mortgage for 
the remaining one thousand, five hundred at seven 
per cent interest, and it was a good thing I did, too. 
I bought the place early in April and in June the 
Interior Department rejected the proof she had 
offered the November before, on account of lack of 
sufficient residence and cultivation. The proof 
had been accepted by the local land office, and a 
final receipt for the remaining installments of the 
purchase price, amounting to four hundred and eighty 
dollars, was issued. A final receipt is considered 
to be equivalent to a patent or deed, but when 
Rattlesnake Jack's proof of residence got to the 
General Land Office in Washington, in quest of a 
patent, the commissioner looked it over, figured up 
the time she actually put in on the place, and re- 
jected the proof, with the statement that it only 
showed about six month's actual residence. At 
that time eight month's residence was required, with 
six months within which to establish residence; 



TheConquest 101 

but no proof could be accepted until after the claim- 
ant had shown eight month's actual and continu- 
ous residence. 

From the time the settlers began to commute or 
prove up on the Little Crow, all proofs which 
did not show fully eight month's residence, were 
rejected. This was done mostly by the Register 
and Receiver of the Local Land Office, and many 
were sent back on their claims to stay longer. 
Many proofs were also taken by local U. S. Commis- 
sioners, County Judges, and Clerks of Courts, but 
these officers rarely rejected them, for by so doing 
they also rejected a four dollar and twenty-five 
cent fee. About one-third of the persons who 
offered proof at that time had them turned down at 
the Local Land Office. This gave the local Com- 
missioners, County Judges, and Clerks of Courts, 
a chance to collect twice for the same work. It 
may be interesting to know that a greater percentage 
of proofs rejected were those offered by women. 
This was perhaps not due to the fact that the ladies 
did not stay on their claims, so much as it was con- 
scientiousness. They could not make a forcible 
showing by saying that they had been there every 
night, like the men would claim, but would say in- 
stead that they had stayed all night with Miss So- 
and-So this time and with another that time, and 
by including a few weeks' visit at home or somewhere 
else, they would bungle their proofs, so they were 
compelled to try again. 

A short time after this and evidently because so 
many proofs had been sent back, the Interior 
Department made it compulsory for the claimant 



102 TheConquest 

to put in fourteen months' actual residence on the 
claim, before he could offer proof. With fourteen 
months, they were sure to stay a full eight months 
at least. This system has been very successful. 

When Rattlesnake Jack was ordered back, after 
selling me the place, she wanted me to sign a quit 
claim deed to her and accept notes for the money 
I had paid, which might have been satisfactory had 
it not been that she thought I had stopped to look 
back and failed to see the rush of progress the Little 
Crow was making; that the long anticipated news 
had been spread, and was now raging like a veritable 
prairie fire, and stirred the people of the Little Crow 
as much as an active stock market stirs the bulls 
on the stock exchange. The report spread and 
stirred the everyday routine of the settlers and the 
finality of humdrum and inactivity was abrupt. 
It came one day in early April. The rain had kept 
the farmers from the fields a week. It had been 
raining for nearly a month, and we only got a clear 
day once in a while. This day it was sloppy with- 
out, and many farmers were in from the country. 
We were all listening to a funny story Ernest Nich- 
olsin was telling, and "good fellows" were listening 
attentively. Dr. Salter, a physician, had just been 
laid on a couch in the back room of the saloon, 
"soused to the gills," when in the door John M. 
Keely, a sort of ne'er do well popular drummer, 
whose proof had been rejected some time before, 
and who had come back to stay "a while longer", 
stumbled into the door of the local groggery. He 
was greeted with sallies and calls of welcome, and 
like many of the others, he was "feeling good." 



TheConquest 103 

He sort of leaned over, and hiccoughing during the 
intervals, started "I've/' the words were spoken 
chockingly,"got news for you." He had by now got 
inside and was hanging and swinging at the same 
time, to the bar. Then before finishing what he 
started, called "Tom," to the bar tender, "give me 
a whiskey before I", and here he leaned over and 
sang the words "tell the boys the news." "For 
the love of Jesus Keel" exclaimed the crowd in 
chorus "tell us what you know." He drained the 
glass at a gulp and finally spit it out. "The sur- 
veyors are in Oristown." 




104 The Conquest 

CHAPTER XV 

"WHICH town will the r. r. strike?" 

HE drummer's information soon received 
corroboration from other sources, and 
although it seemed almost unbelievable, 
it was discussed incessantly and excite- 
ment ran high. These pioneers, who had braved 
the hardships of homestead life had felt that with- 
out the railroad they were indeed cut off from civili- 
zation. To them the advent of the surveyors in 
Oristown could mean only one thing — that their 
dreams of enjoying the many advantages of the 
railroad train, would soon materialize. 

They fell to enumerating these advantages — the 
mail daily, instead of only once or twice a week; 
the ease with which they could make necessary 
trips to the neighboring towns; and most of all — 
the increase in the value of the land. With this 
last subject they became so wrought up with excite- 
ment and anxiety as to the truth of the report, 
that they could stay away from the scene of action 
no longer. Accordingly, buggies and vehicles of 
all descriptions began coming into Oristown from 
all directions. I hitched Doc and my new horse, 
Boliver, for which I had paid one hundred and forty 
dollars, to an old ramshackle buggy I had bought 
for ten dollars, and joined the procession. 

Three miles west of Oristown we came upon a 
crowd of circus-day proportion, and in their midst 
were the surveyors. 

In their lead rode the chief engineer — a slender, 



The Conquest 105 

wiry man with a black mustache and piercing eyes, 
that seemed to observe every feature of surrounding 
prairie. Behind came a wagon loaded with stakes, 
accompanied by several men, the leader of whom 
was setting these stakes according to the signal of 
the engineer from behind the transit. Others, on 
either side, were also driving stakes. They were 
not only running a straight survey, but were cross- 
sectioning as they went. 

Even though the presence of these surveyors 
was now an established fact, these were days of 
grave uncertainties as to just what route the road 
would take. The suspense was almost equal to 
that of the criminal, as he awaits the verdict of the 
jury. The valleys and divides lay in such a man- 
ner that it was possible the survey would extend 
along the Monca, thus passing through Calias. 
On the other hand, it was probable that it would 
continue to the Northwest through Kirk and Me- 
gory, thus missing Calias altogether. 

When the surveyors reached a point five miles 
west of Hedrick, they swerved to the northwest and 
advanced direcly toward Kirk. This looked bad 
for Calias. 

When Ernest Nicholson had learned that the 
surveyors were in Oristown, he had left immediately 
for parts unknown and had not returned. He was 
in reality the founder of Calias and many of the 
inhabitants looked to him as their leader, and de- 
pended upon him for advice. Although he had 
many enemies who heaped abuse and epithets 
upon him— calling him a liar, braggard and ''wind 
jammer" when boasting of their own independence 



106 The Conquest 

and self respect — now that a calamity was about 
to befall them, and their fond hopes for this price- 
less mistress of prairie were about to be wrecked 
upon the shoals of an imaginary railroad survey, 
they turned toward him for comfort, as moths turn 
to a flame. It was Ernest here and Ernest there. 
As the inevitable progress of the surveyors pro- 
ceeded in a direct line for Hedrick, Kirk and Me- 
gory, the consternation of the Caliasites became 
more intense as time went on, and the anxiety for 
Ernest to return almost resolved itself into mutiny. 
It became so significant, that at one time it ap- 
peared that if Ernest had only appeared, the rail- 
road company would have voluntarily run its survey 
directly to Calias, in order to avoid the humiliation 
of Ernest's seizing them by the nape of the neck and 
marching them, survey, cars and all, right into the 
little hamlet. 

Now there was one thing everybody seemed to 
forget or to overlook, but which occurred to me at 
the time, and caused me to become skeptical as to 
the possibilities of the road striking Calias, and 
that was, if the railroad was to be built up the 
Monca Valley, then why had the surveyors come 
to Oristown, and why had they not gotten off at 
Anona, the last station in the Monca Valley, where 
the tracks climb the grade to Fairview. 

Many of the Megory and Kirk boosters had taken 
advantage of Ernest's absence, and through enthu- 
siasm attending the advent of the railroad survey, 
persuaded several of Calias' business men to go 
into fusion in their respective towns. The remain- 
ing handful consoled each other by prophecies of 
what Ernest would do when he returned, and plied 



The Conquest 107 

each other for expressions of theories, and ways and 
means of injecting enthusiasm into the local situa- 
tion. Thousands of theories were given expression, 
consideration, and rejection, and the old one that 
all railroads follow valleys and streams was finally 
adhered to. I was singled out to give corroborative 
proof of this last, by reason of my railroad experience. 

I was suddenly seized with a short memory, much 
to my embarrassment, as I felt all eyes turned upon 
me. However, the crowd were looking for encour- 
agement and spoke up in chorus: "Don't the rail- 
roads always follow valleys?' ' It suddenly oc- 
curred to me, that with all the thousands of miles 
of travel to my credit and the many different states 
I had traveled through, with all their rough and 
smooth territory, I had not observed whether the 
tracks followed the valleys or otherwise. How- 
ever, I intimated that I thought they did. "Of 
course they do", my remark was answered in chorus. 

Since then I have noticed that a railway does in- 
variably follow a valley, if it is a large one; and 
small rivers make excellent routes, but never crooked 
little streams like the Monca. When it comes to 
such creeks, and there is a table land above, as soon 
as the road can get out, it usually stays out. 
This was the situation of the C. & R. W. It came 
some twenty-five or thirty miles up the Monca, from 
where it empties into the Missouri. There are four- 
teen bridges across in that many miles, which were 
and still are, always going out during high water. 

It came this route because there was no other 
way to come, but when it got to Anona, as has been 
said, it climbed a four per cent grade to get out 
and it stayed out. 




108 The Conquest 

CHAPTER XVI 
megory's day 

]]HE first day of May was a local holiday 
in Megory, held in honor of the first 
anniversary of the day when all settlers 
had to be on their claims; and it was 
raining. During the first years on the Little Crow 
we were deluged with rainfall, but this day the in- 
clement weather was disregarded. It was Settler's 
Day and everybody for miles around had journeyed 
thither to celebrate — not only Settler's Day, but 
also the advent of the railroad. Only the day 
before, the surveyors had pitched their tents on the 
outskirts of the town, and on this day they could 
be seen calmly sighting their way across the south 
side of the embryo city. Megory was the scene 
of a continous round of revelry. Five saloons were 
crowded to overflowing, and a score of bartenders 
served thousands of thirsty throats; while on the 
side opposite from the bar, and in the rear, gambling 
was in full blast. Professionals, "tin horns/' 
and "pikers", in their shirt sleeves worked away 
feverishly drawing in and paying money to the 
crowd that surged around the Roulette, the Chuck- 
luck, and the Faro-bank. It seemed as though 
everybody drank and gambled. "This is Megory's 
Day", they called between drinks, and it would echo 
with "have another," "watch Megory grow." 

Written in big letters and hung all along the 
streets were huge signs which read "Megory, the 
gateway to a million acres of the richest land in the 



The Conquest 109 

world/' "Megory, the future metropolis of the 
Little Crow, Watch her grow! Watch her grow!" 
The board walk four feet wide could not hold the 
crowd. It was a day of frenzied celebration — a 
day when no one dared mention Nicholson's name 
unless they wanted to hear them called liars, wind 
jammers, and all a bluff. 

Ernest was still in the East and no one seemed to 
know where he was, or what he was doing. The 
surveyors had passed through Megory and extended 
the survey to the county line, five miles west of the 
town. The right-of-way man was following and 
had just arrived from Hedrick and Kirk, where he 
had made the same offer he was now making 
Megory. "If" he said, addressing the "town 
dads" and he seemed to want it clearly understood, 
"the C. & R. W. builds to Megory, we want you to 
buy the right-of-way three miles east and four miles 
west of the town." 

Then Governor Reulback, known as the "Squat- 
ter Governor," acting as spokesman for the citizens, 
arose from his seat on the rude platform, and before 
accepting the proposition — needless to say it was 
accepted — called on different individuals for short 
talks. Among others he called on Ernest Nichol- 
son; but Frank, the Junior member of the firm, arose 
and answered that Ernest was away engaged in 
purchasing the C. & R. W. railroad and that he, 
answering for Ernest, had nothing to say. A hush 
fell on the crowd, but Governor Reulbach, who 
possessed a well defined sense of humor, responded 
with a joke, saying, "Mr. Nicholson's being away 
purchasing the C. & R. W. railroad reminds me of 



110 The Conquest 

the Irishman who played poker all night, and the 
next morning, yawning and stretching himself, said, 
"Oi lost nine hundred dollars last night and seven 
and one-half of it was cash." 

The backbone of the town was beginning to 
weaken, while there were many who continued to 
insist that there was hope. Others contracted 
rheumatism from vigils at the surveyor's camp, in 
vain hope of gaining some information as to the 
proposed direction of the right-of-way. The pur- 
chasing of the right-of-way and the unloading of 
carload after carload of contracting material at 
Oristown did little to encourage the belief that there 
was a ghost of a show for Calias. 

In a few days corral tents were decorating the 
right-of-way at intervals of two miles, all the way 
from Oristown to Megory. In the early morning, 
as the sound of distant thunder, could be heard the 
dull thud of clods and dirt dropping into the wagon 
from the elevator of the excavator; also the famil- 
iar "jup" and the thud of the "skinner V lines as 
they struck the mules, in Calias one and one-half 
miles away. 

A very much discouraged and weary crowd met 
Ernest when he returned, but even in defeat this 
young man's personality was pleasing. He was 
frank in telling the people that he had done all that 
he could. He had gone to Omaha where his father 
in-law joined him, thence to Des Moines, where 
his father maintained his office as president of an 
insurance company, that made loans on Little Crow 
land. Together with two capitalists, friends of 
his father, they had gone into Chicago and held 



TheConquest 111 

a conference with Marvin Hewitt, President of 
the C. & R. W. who had showed them the blue 
prints, and, as he put it, any reasonable man could 
see it would be utterly impossible to strike Calias 
in the route they desired to go. The railroad 
wanted to strike the Government town sites, but 
the president told them that if at any time he could 
do them a favor to call on him, and he would gladly 
do so. 

In a few days a man named John Nodgen came to 
Calias. Towns which had failed to get a road 
looked upon him in the way a sick man would an 
undertaker. He was a red-haired Irishman with 
teeth wide apart and wildish blue eyes, who had the 
reputation of moving more towns than any other one 
man. He brought horses and wagons, block and 
tackle, and massive steel trucks. He swore like a 
stranded sailor, and declared they would hold up 
any two buildings in Calias. 

The saloon was the first building deserted. The 
stock had not been removed when the house movers 
arrived, and in some way they got the door open 
and helped themselves to the "booze," and when 
full enough to be good and noisy, began jacking up 
the building that had been the pride of the hopeful 
Caliasites. In a few weeks a large part of what 
had been Calias was in Megory and a small part in 
Kirk. 

It had stopped raining for a while, and several 
large buildings were still on the move to Megory 
when the rain set in again. This was the latter part 
of July and how it did rain, every day and night. 
One store building one hundred feet long had been 



112 Tjh e C on quest 

cut in two so as to facilitate moving, and the rains 
caught it half way on the road to Megory. After 
many days of sticking and floundering around in 
the mud, at a cost of over fourteen hundred dollars 
for the moving alone, not counting the goods 
spoiled, it arrived at its new home. The building 
in the beginning had cost only twenty-three hundred 
dollars, out of which thirty cents per hundred had 
been paid for local freighting from Oristown. The 
merchant paid one thousand dollars for his lot in 
Megory, and received ten dollars for the one he 
left in Calias. 

This was the reason why Rattlesnake Jack's 
father and I could not get together when he came 
out and showed me Rattlesnake Jack's papers. 
It was bad and I readily agreed with him. I also 
agreed to sign a quit claim deed, thereby clearing 
the place, so she could complete her proof. Every- 
thing went along all right, until it came to signing 
up. Then I suggested that as I had broken eighty 
acres of prairie, the railroad was in course of con- 
struction, and land had materially increased in 
valuation — having sold as high as five thousand 
dollars a quarter section — I should have a guarantee 
that he would sell the place back to me when the 
matter had been cleared up. 

"I will see that you get the place back" — he 
pretended to reassure me — when she proves up 
again. 

"Then we will draw up an agreement to that 
effect and make it one thousand dollars over what 
I paid", I suggested. 

"I will do nothing of the kind," he roared, 
brandishing his arms as though he wanted to fight, 

/ 

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The Conquest 113 

"and if you will not sign a quit claim without such 
an agreement, I will have Jack blow the whole 
thing, that is what I will do, do you hear?" He 
fairly yelled, leaning forward and pointing his 
finger at me in a threatening manner. 

"Then we will call it off for today," I replied with 
decision, and we did. I confess however, I was 
rather frightened. In the beginning I had not 
worried, as he held a first mortgage of one thousand, 
five hundred dollars, I had felt safe and thought 
that they had to make good to me in order to pro- 
tect their own interests. But now as I thought 
the matter over it began to look different. If he 
should have her relinquish, then where would I 
be, and the one thousand, five hundred dollars I 
had paid them? 

I was very much disturbed and called on Ernest 
Nicholson and informed him how the matter stood. 
He listened carefully and when I was through he 
said: 

"They gave you a warranty deed, did they not?" 
"Yes, I replied, it is over at the bank of Calias." 
"Then let it stay there. Tell him, or the old man 
rather, to have the girl complete sufficient resi- 
dence, then secure you for all the place is worth at 
the time; then, and not before, sign a quit claim, and 
if they want to sell you the place, well and good; if 
not, you will have enough to buy another." And 
I followed his advice. 

It was fourteen months, however, before the 
Scotch-Irish blood in him would submit to it. But 
there was nothing he could do, for the girl 
had given me a deed to something she did not have 
title to herself, and had accepted one thousand, 



114 The Conquest 

five hundred dollars in cash from me in return. As 
the matter stood, I was an innocent party. 

About this time I became imbued with a feeling 
that I would like "most awfully well" to have a 
little help-mate to love and cheer me. How often 
I longed for company to break the awful and monot- 
onous lonesomeness that occasionally enveloped me. 
At that time, as now, I thought a darling little 
colored girl, to share all my trouble and grief, would 
be interesting indeed. Often my thoughts had 
reverted to the little town in Illinois, and I had pic- 
tured Jessie caring for the little sod house and cheer- 
ing me when I came from the fields. For a time, such 
blissful thoughts sufficed the longing in my heart, 
but were soon banished when I recalled her seeming 
preference for the three dollar a week menial, 
another attack of the blues would follow, and my 
day dreams became as mist before the sun. 

About this time I began what developed into 
a flirtatious correspondence with a St. Louis octo- 
roon. She was a trained nurse; very attractive, 
and wrote such charming and interesting letters, 
that for a time they afforded me quite as much 
entertainment, perhaps more, than actual company 
would have done. In fact I became so enamored 
with her that I nearly lost my emotional mind, and 
almost succumbed to her encouragement toward 
a marriage proposal. The death of three of my 
best horses that fall diverted my interest; she 
ceased the epistolary courtship, and I continued 
to batch. 

Doc, my big horse, got stuck in the creek and was 
drowned. The loss of Doc was hardest for me to 
bear, for he was a young horse, full of life, and I had 



The Conquest 115 

grown fond of him. Jenny mule would stand for 
hours every night and whinny for him. 

In November, Bolivar, his mate — the horse I 
had paid one hundred and forty dollars for not 
nine months before — got into the wheat, became 
foundered, and died. 

While freighting from Oristown, in December, 
one of a team of dapple grays fell and killed himself. 
So in three months I lost three horses that had 
cost over four hundred dollars, and the last had not 
even been paid for. I had only three left, the other 
dapple gray, Jenny mule, and "Old Grayhead," 
the relic of my horse-trading days. I had put in 
a large crop of wheat the spring before and had 
threshed only a small part of it before the cold 
winter set in, and the snow made it quite impossible 
to complete threshing before spring. 

That was one of the cold winters which usually 
follow a wet summer, and I nearly froze in my little 
old soddy, before the warm spring days set in. Sod 
houses are warm as long as the mice, rats, and 
gophers do not bore them full of holes, but as they 
had made a good job tunneling mine, I was left to 
welcome the breezy atmosphere, and I did not think 
the charming nurse would be very happy in such 
a mess " nohow. " The thought that I was not 
mean enough to ask her to marry me and bring her 
into it, was consoling indeed. 

Since I shall have much to relate farther along 
concerning the curious and many sided relations 
that existed between Calias, Megory, and other con- 
tending and jealous communities, let me drop this 
and return to the removal of Calias to Megory. 

The Nicholson Brothers had already installed an 



116 The Conquest 

office in the successful town, and offered to move 
their interests to that place and combine with Meg- 
ory in making the town a metropolis. But the 
town dads, feeling they were entirely responsible 
for the road striking the town, with the flush 
of victory and the sensation of empire builders, 
disdained the offer. 

In this Megory had made the most stupid mistake 
of her life, and which later became almost monu- 
mental in its proportions. It will be seen how in the 
flush of apparent victory she lost her head, and looked 
back to stare and reflect at the retreating and 
temporary triumph of her youth; and in that in- 
stant the banner of victory was snatched from her 
fingers by those who offered to make her apparent 
victory real, and who ran swiftly, skillfully, and 
successfully to a new and impregnable retreat of 
their own. 

The Megory town dads were fairly bursting 
with rustic pride, and were being wined and dined 
like kings, by the citizens of the town — who had 
contributed the wherewith to pay for the seven 
miles of right-of-way. Besides, the dads were 
puffed young roosters just beginning to crow, and 
were boastful as well. So Nicholson Brothers got 
the horse laugh, which implied that Megory did 
not need them. "We have made Megory and now 
watch her grow. Haw! Haw! Haw! Watch her grow," 
came the cry, when the report spread that the town 
dads had turned Nicholson's offer down. 

Megory was the big I am of the Little Crow. 
Then Ernest went away on another long trip. It 
was cold weather, with the ground frozen, when he 
returned. 




The Conquest 117 

CHAPTER XVII 

ERNEST NICHOLSON'S RETURN— THE BUILDING WEST 
OF TOWN — "WHAT'S IT ALL ABOUT" 

|HE big hotel from Calias had not long 
since been unloaded and decorated a 
corner lot in Megory. All that re- 
mained in Calias were the buildings 
belonging to Nicholson Brothers, consisting of an 
old two-story frame hotel, a two-story bank, the 
saloon, drug store, their own office and a few smaller 
ones. It was a hard life for the Caliasites and the 
Megoryites were not inclined to soften it. On the 
other hand, she was growing like a mushroom. 
Everything tended to make it the prairie metro- 
polis; land was booming, and buyers were plentiful. 
Capital was also finding its way to the town, and 
nothing to disturb the visible prosperity. 

But a shrewd person, at that very time, had control 
of machinery that would cause a radical change in 
this community, and in a very short time too. This 
man was Ernest Nicholson, and referring to his 
return, I was at the depot in Oristown the day he 
arrived. There he boarded an auto and went west 
to Megory. On his arrival there, he ordered John 
Nogden to proceed to Calias, load the bank build- 
ing, get all the horses obtainable, and proceed at 
once to haul the building to — no, not to Megory — 
this is what the Megoryites thought, when, with 
seventy-six head of horses hitched to it, they saw 
the bank of Calias coming toward Megory. But 
when it got to within half a mile of the south 



118 The Conquest 

side, swerved off to the west. About six that 
evening, when the sun went down, the Bank of 
Calias was sitting on the side of a hill that sloped 
to the north, near the end of the survey. 

Now what did it mean? That was the question 
that everybody began asking everybody else. 
What was up? Why was Ernest Nicholson moving 
the bank of Calias five miles west of Megory and 
setting it down on or near the end of the survey? 
There were so many questions being asked with 
no one to answer, that it amused me. Then some- 
one suggested that it might be the same old game, 
and here would come a pause, then the question, 
"What old game?" "Why, another Calias?"— 
some bait to make money. Then, "Oh, I see," 
said the wise town dads, just a hoax. That answered 
the question, just a snare to catch the unwary. 
Tell them that the railroad would build to the Tipp 
County line. Sell them some lots, for that is what 
the "bluff" meant. Get their good money and 
then, Oh, Ha! Ha! Ha! it was too funny when one 
saw the joke, and Megory ites continued to laugh. 
Had not Nicholson Brothers said a whole lot about 
getting the railroad; and that it was sure coming 
up the Monca. It had come, had it not. Haw! 
Haw! Haw! Ho! Ho! Ho! just another Nicholson 
stall, Haw! Haw! Haw! and Nicholsons got the 
laugh again. The railroad is in Megory, and here 
it will stop for ten years. One hundred thousand 
people will come to Megory to register for Tipp 
County lands, and "Watch Megory grow" was all 
that could be heard. 

Ernest would come to Megory, have a pleasant 



The Conquest 119 

chat, treat the boys, tell a funny story, and be 
off. Nobody was mean enough or bold enough 
to tell him to his face any of the things they told 
to his back. 

Ernest was never known to say anything about 
it. His sch&ne simply kept John Nogden moving 
buildings. He wrote checks in payment, that the 
bank of C alias cashed, for it was open for business 
the next day after it had been moved out on the 
prairie, five miles west of Megory. 

The court record showed six quarter sections of 
land west of town had recently been transferred; 
the name of the receiver was unknown to anyone 
in Megory, but such prices, forty to fifty dollars 
per acre. The people who had sold, brought the 
money to the Megory banks, and deposited it. 
All they seemed to know was that someone drove 
up to their house and asked if they wanted to sell. 
Some did not, while others said they were only 
five miles from Megory, and if they sold they would 
have to have a big price, because Megory was the 
"Town of the Little Crow "fandfthef gate way to 
acres of the finest land in the world, to be opened 
soon. "What is your price?" he would ask, and 
whether it was forty, forty-five or fifty per acre, 
he bought it. 

This must have gone on for sixty days with every- 
body wondering "what it was all about", until it 
got on the nerves of the Megoryites; and even the 
town dads began to get a little fearful. When 
Ernest was approached he would wink wisely, 
hand out a cigar or buy a drink, but he never made 
anybody the wiser. 



120 The Conquest 

A lady came out from Des Moines, bought a lot, 
and let a contract for a hotel building 24x140, and 
work was begun on it immediately. This was 
getting ahead of Megory, where a hotel had just 
been completed 25x100 feet, said by the Megoryites 
to be the "best" west of a town of six thousand 
population, one hundred fifty miles down the 
road. Whenever anything like a real building 
goes up in a little town on the prairie, with their 
collection of shacks, it is always called "the best 
building" between there and somewhere else. 

I shall not soon forget the anxiety with which the 
people watched the building which continued to 
go up west of Megory, and still no one there seemed 
willing to admit that Nicholson Brothers were 
"live," but spent their argument in trying to con- 
vince someone that they were only wind jammers and 
manipulators of knavish plots, to immesh the credu- 
lous. 

What actually happened was this, and Ernest 
told me about it afterwards in about the following 
words: 

"Well, Oscar, after Megory turned our offer 
down, I knew there were just two things to do, 
and that was, to either make good or leave the 
country. Megory is full of a lot of fellows that 
have never known anything but Keya Paha county, 
and when the road missed Calias, and struck 
Megory, they took the credit for displaying a super- 
ior knowledge. I knew we were going to be the 
big laughing stock of the reservation, and since I 
did not intend to leave the country, I got to think- 
ing. The more I pondered the matter, the more 



The Conquest 121 

determined I became that something had to be 
done, and I finally made up my mind to do it." 
Ernest Nicholson was not the kind of a man to 
make idle declarations. "I went down to Omaha 
and saw some business friends of mine and suggested 
to them just what I intended to do, thence to Des 
Moines and got father, and again we went into 
Chicago and secured an appointment with Hewitt, 
who listened attentively to all that we had to say, 
and the import of this was that Megory, being over 
five miles east of the Tipp County line, it was diffi- 
cult to drive range cattle that distance through 
a settled country. They are so unused to anything 
that resembles civilization, that ranchers hate to 
drive even five miles through a settled country, 
besides the annoyance it would habitually cause 
contrary farmers, when it comes to accommodating 
the ranchers. But that is not all. With sixty-six 
feet open between the wire fences, the range cattle 
at any time are liable to start a stampede, go right 
through, and a lot of damage follows. I showed 
him that most of the cattle men were still driving 
their stock north and shipping over the C. P. & 
St. L. Now knowing that the directors had or- 
dered the extension of the line to get the cattle 
business, Hewitt looked serious, finally arose from 
his chair, and went over to a map that entirely 
covered the side of the wall and showed all the lines 
of the C. & R. W. He meditated a few minutes 
and then turned around and said: "Go back and 
buy the land that has been described." It all 
seemed simple enough when it was done. 

By the time that the extension had been com- 



122 The Conquest 

pleted to Megory, the building that had been moved 
west of town had company in the way of many new 
ones, and by this time comprised quite a burg, 
and claimed the name of New Calias. The new 
was to distinguish between its old site and its 
present one. After Megory turned them down, 
Ernest had made a declaration or defiance that he 
would build a town on the Little Crow and its name 
would be Calias. 




The Conquest 123 

CHAPTER XVIII 

COMES STANELY, THE CHIEF ENGINEER 

EGORY was still on the boom, not quite 
as much as the summer before, but 
more than it was some time later, for 
as yet New Calias was still regarded as 
a joke, until one day Stanley, the same wiry- 
looking individual with the black mustache and 
the piercing eyes, got off the stage at Megory and 
began to do the same work he had started west 
of Oristown the year before. 

Oh, it was a shame to thus wreck the selfish dreams 
of these Megoryites upon the rocks of their own 
shortsightedness. Stanley was followed a few days 
later by a grade contractor, who had been to Me- 
gory the summer before and who had became popu- 
lar around town, and was known to be a good 
spender. They had bidden him good-bye along in 
December, and although nothing was said about 
it, the truth was, Megory did not wish to see any 
more railroad contractors, for a while, not for five 
or ten years anyway. 

It is a peculiar thing that when a railroad stops 
at some little western burg, that it is always going 
to stay ten or twenty years. This has always been 
the case before, according to the towns at the end 
of the line, and at this time Megory was of the same 
opinion as regarded the extension to New Calias. 
So Oristown had been in regard to the extension 
to Megory. But Trelway built the road to New 
Calias, and built it the quickest I ever saw a road 



124 TheConquest 

built. The first train came to Megory on a Sunday 
in June — (Schedules always commence on Sunday) 
and September found the same train in Calias, 
the "New" having been dropped. 

Megoryites admitted very grudgingly, a short 
time before, that the train would go on to Calias 
but would return to Megory to stay over night, 
where it left at six o'clock the following morning. 
Now at Megory the road had a "Y" that ran onto 
a pasture on a two years lease, while at Calias coal 
chutes, a "Y", a turning table, a round house, and 
a large freight depot were erected. 

And then began one of the most bitter fights 
between towns that I ever saw or even read about. 

Five miles apart, with Calias perched on another 
hill, and like the old site, could be seen from miles 
around. Now the terminus, it loomed conspicu- 
ously. It was a foregone conclusion that when the 
reservation to the west opened, Calias was in the 
right position to handle the crowds that came to 
the territory to the west, instead of Megory. Me- 
gory contended, however, that Calias, located on 
such a hill, could never hope for an abundance of 
good water and therefore could not compete with 
Megory, with her natural advantages, such as an 
abundance of good soft water, which was obtainable 
anywhere in town. 

There are certain things concrete in the future 
growth of a prairie town; the first is, has it a rail- 
road; the next is, is the agricultural territory suffi- 
cient to support a good live town (a fair sized town 
in either one of the Dakotas has from one thousand 
to three thousand inhabitants); and last, are the 



The Conquest 125 

business men of the town modern, progressive, and 
up to date. In this respect Calias had the ad- 
vantage over Megory, as will be seen later. 

Megory became my postoffice address after Calias 
had moved to its new location, and about that 
time the first rural mail route was established 
on the reservation. Megory boasted of this. 
The other things it boasted of, was its great 
farming territory. For miles in every direction 
tributary to the town, the land was ideal for farming 
purposes, and at the beginning of the bitter rivalry 
between the two towns, Megory had the big end of 
the farm trade. They could see nothing else but 
Megory, which helped the town's business consider- 
ably. 




126 The Conquest 

CHAPTER XIX 

IN THE VALLEY OF THE KEYA PAHA. THE RIVALS, 
THE VIG1LANTS 

jJOTHING is more essential to the up- 
building of the small western town, 
than a good agricultural territory, and 
this was where Calias found its first 
handicap. When it had moved to its new loca- 
tion, scores of investors had flocked to the town, 
paying the highest prices that had ever been paid 
for lots in a new country town, of its kind, in the 
central west. 

Twenty-five miles south of the two towns, where 
a sand stream known as the Keya Paha wends its 
way, is a fertile valley. It had been settled thirty 
years before by eastern people, who hauled their 
hogs and drove their cattle and sheep fifty miles 
in a southerly direction, to a railroad. Although 
the valley could not be surpassed in the production 
of corn, wheat, oats, and alfalfa, the highlands on 
either side are great mountains of sand, which pro- 
duce nothing but a long reddish grass, that stock 
will not eat after it reaches maturity, and which 
stands in bunches, with the sand blown from around 
its roots, to such an extent that riding or driving 
over it is very difficult. 

These hills rise to heights until they resemble 
the Sierras, and near the top, on the northwest slope 
of each, are cave-like holes where the strong winds 
have blown a squeegee. 

The wagon road to the railway on the south was 
sandy and made traveling over it slow and hazard- 



The Conquest 127 

ous by the many pits and dunes. Therefore, it is 
to be seen, when the C. & R. W. pushed its line 
through Megory County, everything that had been 
going to the road on the south began immediately 
to come to the road on the north — where good hard 
roads made the traveling much easier, and further- 
more, it was only half the distance. 

Keya Paha County was about as lonely a place 
as I had ever seen. After the sun went down, the 
coyotes from the adjacent sand hills, in a series of 
mournful howls, filled the air with a noise which 
echoed and re-echoed throughout the valley, like 
the music of so many far-away steam calliopes and 
filled me with a cold, creepy feeling. For thirty 
years these people had heard no other sound save the 
same monotonous howls and saw only each other. 
The men went to Omaha occasionally with cattle, 
but the women and children knew little else but 
Keya Paha County. 

During a trip into this valley the first winter I 
spent on the homestead, in quest of seed wheat, 
I met and talked with families who had children, in 
some instances twenty years of age, who had never 
seen a colored man. Sometimes the little tads 
would run from me, screaming as though they had 
met a lion or some other wild beast of the forest. 
At one place where I stopped over night, a little 
girl about nine years of age, looked at me with so 
much curiosity that I became amused, finally 
coaxing her onto my knee. She continued to look 
hard at me, then meekly reached up and touched 
my chin, looked into my eyes, and said :" Why don't 
you wash your face?" When supper was ready 



128 The Conquest 

went to the sink and washed my face and hands; 
she watched me closely in the meanwhile, and when 
I was through, appeared to be vexed and with an 
expression as if to say: "He has cleaned it thor- 
oughly, but it is dirty still/' 

About twenty years previous to this time, or about 
ten years after settlement in this valley, the pioneers 
were continually robbed of much of their young 
stock. Thieving outlaws kept up a continuous 
raid on the young cattle and colts, driving them onto 
the reservation, where they disappeared. This 
continued for years, and it was said many of the 
county officials encouraged it, in a way, by delaying 
a trial, and inasmuch as the law and its procedure 
was very inadequate, on account of the county's 
remote location, the criminals were rarely punished. 

After submitting to such until all reasonable pa- 
tience had been exhausted, the settlers formed "a 
vigilant committee," and meeted out punishment to 
the evil doers, who had become over-bold and were 
well known. After hanging a few, as well as whip- 
ping many, the vigilanters ridded the county of 
rustlers, and lived in peace thereafter. 

At the time the railroad was built to Megory there 
was little activity other than the common routine 
attending their existence. But with Megory 
twenty-five miles to the north, and many of her 
former active and prosperous citizens living there; 
and while board walks and "shack" buildings still 
represented the Main Street, Megory was considered 
by the people of the valley very much of a city, and 
a great place to pay a visit. Many had never seen 
or ridden on a railroad train, so Megory sounded in 




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The Conquest 129 

Keya Paha County as Chicago does to the down 
state people of Illionis. 

The people of Keya Paha County had grown 
prosperous, however, and the stock shipments com- 
prised many train loads, during an active market. 
Practically all this was coming to Megory when 
Calias began to loom prominent as a model little 
city. 

I could see two distinct classes, or personages, in 
the leaders of the two towns. Beginning with 
Ernest Nicholson, the head of the firm of Nicholson 
Brothers and called by Megoryites "chief" "high 
mogul/' the "big it" and "I am," in absolute control 
of Calias affairs; and the former Keya Paha County 
sand rats — as they are sometimes called — running 
Megory. The two contesting parties presented a 
contrast which interested me. 

The Nicholson Brothers were all college-bred 
boys, with a higher conception of things in general; 
were modern, free and up-to-date. While Megory's 
leaders were as modern as could be expected, but 
were simply outclassed in the style and perfection 
that the Calias bunch presented. Besides, the 
merchants and business men — in the "stock yards 
west of Megory/ ' as Calias was cartooned by a 
Megory editor, were much of the same ilk. And 
referring to the cartoon, it pictured the editor of the 
Calias News as a braying jackass in a stock pen, 
which brought a great laugh from Megoryites, but 
who got it back, however, the next week by being 
pictured asa stagnant pond, with two Megory editors 
as a couple of big bull-frogs. This had the effect 
of causing the town to begin grading the streets, 

9 



130 The Conquest 

putting in cement walks and gutters, for Megory 
had located in the beginning in an extremely bad 
place. The town was located in a low place, full of 
alkali spots, buffalo wallows underlaid with hardpan, 
which caused the surface to hold water to such an 
extent, that, when rain continued to fall any 
length of time, the cellars and streets stood in water. 

But Megory had the start, with the largest and 
best territory, which had by this time been developed 
into improved farms; the real farmer was fast replac- 
ing the homesteader. It had the biggest and best 
banks. Regardless of all the efficiency of Calias, 
it appeared weak in its banking. Now a farmer 
could go to Nicholson Brothers, and get the largest 
farm loan because the boys' father was president of 
an insurance company that made the loan, but 
the banks there were short in the supply of 
time loans on stock security, but Calias' greatest 
disadvantage was, that directly west in Tipp County 
the Indians had taken their allotments within 
seven or eight miles of the town, and there was 
hardly a quarter section to be homesteaded. 

Now there was no doubt but that in the course 
of time the Indian allotments would be bought, 
whenever the government felt disposed to grant 
the Indian a patent; which under the laws is 
not supposed to be issued until the expiration of 
twenty-five years. People, however, would prob- 
ably lease the land, break it up and farm it; but that 
would not occur until some future date, and Calias 
needed it at the present time. 

A western town, in most instances, gets its boom 
in the beginning, for later a dry rot seems an inevi- 



The Conquest 131 

table condition, and is likely to overtake it after the 
first excitement wears away. Resurrection is rare. 
These were the conditions that faced the town on 
the Little Crow, at the beginning of the third year of 
settlement. 



132 



The Conquest 




CHAPTER XX 

THE OUT LAW'S LAST STAND 

FTER the vigilants had frightened the 
outlaws into abandoning their opera- 
tions in the valley, the thieves skulked 
across the reservation to a strip of coun- 
try some twenty-five miles northeast of where Me- 
gory now stands. Here, on the east, the murky 
waters of the Missouri seek their level; to the 
north the White River runs like a cow-path through 
the foot hills — twisting and turning into innumerable 
bends, with its lime-like waters lapping the sides, 
bringing tons of shale from the gorgeous, dark banks, 
into its current; while on the south runs the Whet- 
stone, inclosed by many rough, ragged brown hills, 
and to the west are the breaks of Landing Creek. 
In an angle between these creeks and rivers, lies a 
perfect table land known as Yully Flats, which is 
the most perfectly laying land and has the richest 
soil of any spot on the Little Crow. It took its 
name from a famous outlaw and squaw-man, by the 
name of Jack Yully. With him the thieves from the 
Keya Paha Valley found co-operation, and together 
had, a few years previously operated as the most 
notorious band of cattle rustlers the state had 
known. For a hundred miles in every direction 
this band plundered, stole, and ran the cattle and 
horses onto the flats, where they were protected by 
the breaks of the creeks and rivers, referred to. 
Mixed with half, quarter, eighth and sixteenth 
breeds, they knew every nook and crook of the 




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the Conquest 133 

country. These operations had lasted until the 
year of the Little Crow opening, and it was there 
that Jack Yully made his last stand. 

He had for many years defied the laws of the 
county and state, and had built a magnificent 
residence near a spring that pours its sparkling 
waters into a small lake, where now stands a sani- 
tarium. Yully had been chief overseer, dictator, 
and arbitrator of the combined forces of Little Crow 
and Keya Paha County outlaws and mixed bloods. 
The end came when, on a bright day in June, a posse 
led by the United States Marshal sneaked across 
the Whetstone and secrected themselves in a cache 
between Yully's corral and the house. Yully was 
seen to enter the corral and having laid a trap, a 
part of the men, came in from another direction and 
made as if to advance when Yully made a run for 
his house, which took him alongside the men hidden. 
Before he could change his course he was halted and 
asked to surrender. He answered by dropping to 
the opposite side of the horse and began firing. In 
the skirmish that followed the horse was shot and 
fell on Yully, but in the shot's exchange two of the 
posse and Yully were killed. 




134 The Conquest 

CHAPTER XXI 

THE BOOM 

|HIS valuable tract of land comprising 
about fifty thousand acres had been 
entered after the opening, by settlers, 
and lay about as near to Kirk as it did 
to Megory, hence its trade was sought by both 
towns, but with Kirk getting the larger part until 
Megory established a mill, which paid two cents 
more for wheat, and the farmers took advantage by 
hauling most of their produce to the former town. 
This included another strip of rich territory to the 
north of Megory and west of Landing Creek, where 
the soil is a rich gumbo, and the township thickly 
settled so it is readily seen that Megory was ad- 
vantageously situated to draw from all directions. 
This soon brought such a volume of business into the 
town as to make the most fastidious envy it, and 
the Megoryites were well aware of their enviable 
position. The town continued to grow in a sound, 
substantial way. 

Nicholson Brothers began leading booster trade 
excursions to the north, south, and east, with Ernest 
at the head in a big "Packard" making clever 
speeches and inviting all the farmers to come to 
Calias, where a meal at the best hotel was given 
free. A good, live, and effective commercial club 
was organized, which guaranteed to pay all a hog, 
cow, or calf would bring on the Omaha market, 
minus the freight and expenses. 
Ernest would explain with deep sincerity which 



The Conquest 135 

impressed the farmers of the valley, as well as the 
settlers on the Little Crow, that Calias wanted a 
share of their business, and was willing to sacrifice 
profit for two years in order to have the farmers 
come to the town and get acquainted, to see what 
the merchants, bankers and real estate dealers had 
to offer. In making this offer the people of Calias 
had the advantage over Megory, in that it derived 
profits from other sources, chiefly from great numbers 
of transients who were beginning to fill the hotels, 
restaurants, saloons, and boarding houses of the 
town. Being the end of the road and the place where 
practically every settler coming to Tipp County 
must stay at least one night, it stood to reason they 
could make such an inducement and stick to it. 

However, this was countered immediately by 
Megoryites who promptly organized a commercial 
club and began the same kind of bid for trade. 
Thus the small ranchmen of the valley found them- 
selves an object of much importance and began to 
awaken a little. 

Now the land of the reservation had taken on a 
boom such as had never been realized, or dreamed 
of. Land in the states of Iowa, Minnesota, Illinois, 
and Nebraska had doubled in valuation in the pre- 
vious ten years, and was still on the increase in value. 
Crops had been good and money was plentiful; 
with a number of years of unbroken prosperity, the 
farmers had paid off mortgages and had a good 
surplus in the bank. Their sons and daughters 
were looking for newer fields. Retired farmers 
with their land to rent now, instead of the customary 
one-third delivered, demanded and received from two- 



136 The Conquest 

fifths to one-half, or cash, from three to five and six 
dollars per acre. And with the prices in these states 
ranging from ninety to one hundred and fifty dollars 
per acre, which meant from fifteen to twenty-five 
thousand dollars to buy a quarter section, which 
the renters felt was too high to ever be paid for by 
farming it. Therefore, western lands held an at- 
traction, where with a few thousand dollars, some 
stock, and machinery a man could establish a good 
home. As this land in southern South Dakota is 
in the Corn Belt, the erstwhile investor and home- 
seeker found a haven. 

There is always more or less gossip as regards in- 
sufficient moisture in a new country. The only 
thing to kill this bogy is to have plenty of rain, and 
plenty of rain had fallen on the Little Crow, too much 
at times. Large crops of everything had been 
harvested, but if the first three years had been wet, 
this fourth was one of almost continual rainfall. 

In the eastern states the corn crop had been badly 
drowned out on the low lands, and rust had cut the 
yield of small grain considerably, while on the rolling 
land of the Little Crow the season was just right and 
everything grew so rank, thick and green that it 
gave the country, a raw prairie until less than four 
years before, the appearance of an old settled coun- 
try. It looked good to the buyers and they bought. 
Farms were sold as soon as they were listed. The 
price at the beginning of the year had been from 
twenty-five to forty dollars per acre, some places 
more, but after the first six months of the year it 
began to climb to forty-five and then to fifty dol- 
lars per acre. Those who owned Little Crow farms 



The Conquest 137 

became objects of much importance. If they de- 
sired to sell they had only to let it be known, and a 
buyer was soon on hand. 

The atmosphere seemed charged with drunken 
enthusiasm. Everybody had it. There was noth- 
ing to fear. Little Crow land was the best property 
to be had, better, they would declare, than govern- 
ment bonds, for its value was increasing in leaps and 
bounds. Choice farms close to town, if bought at 
fifty dollars per acre, could be sold at a good profit 
in a short time. 

This was done, and good old eastern capital 
continued to be paid for the land. 

The spirit of unrest that seem to pervade the at- 
mosphere of the community was not altogether the 
desire to have and to hold, but more, to buy and to 
sell. Homesteads were sold in Megory county and 
the proceeds were immediately reinvested in Tipp, 
where considerable dead Indian land could be pur- 
chased at half the price. 

At about that time the auto fever began to infect 
the restless and over-prosperous settlers, and busi- 
ness men alike. That was the day of the many 
two-cylinder cars. They made a dreadful noise but 
they moved and moved faster than horses. They 
sailed over the country, the exhaust of the engine 
making a cracking noise. The motion, added to 
the speed, seemed to thrill and enthuse the investor 
until he bought whether he cared to or not. 

In previous years, when capital was not so plenti- 
ful, and when land was much cheaper and slower to 
sell, the agent drove the buyer over the land from 
corner to corner, cross-wise and angling, and the 



138 The Conquest 

buyer would get out here and there and with a spade 
dig into the ground, and be convinced as to the 
quality of the soil. He then pondered the matter 
over for days, weeks, and sometimes months. 
Then maybe he would go back and bring "the 
woman.' ' The land dealers seriously object to 
buyers bringing "the woman' ' along, especially if 
the farm he has to sell has any serious drawbacks, 
such, for instance, as a lack of water. There were 
numerous farms on the high lands of the Little Crow 
where water could not be found, but they were in- 
variably perfect in every other respect. The per- 
fection in the laying of the land and quality of the 
soil was severely offset by the inability to get water. 
While on the rougher and less desirable farms water 
can be easily obtained in the draws and the hills. 
But the high lands were the more attractive and 
were sold at higher prices and much quicker, regard- 
less of the obvious defects. 

Now if "the woman" was brought to look it over 
one of the first inquires she made would be, "Now 
is there plenty of water ?" furthermore she was liable 
to steal a march on the dealer by having her husband 
hire a livery team, and with the eastern farmer and 
his wife drive out to the place and look the farm over 
without the agent to steer them clear of the bad 
places. They not only looked it over, but make 
inquiries of the neighbors as to its merits. Now 
country people have the unpardonable habit of 
gossip, and have complicated many deals of the real- 
estate men by this weakness, even caused many to 
fall through, until, the land sharks are usually 
careful to prevent a buyer from having a conver- 
sation with "Si." 



The Conquest 139 

In my case, however, this was quite different. 
I was known as "a booster", and since my land was 
located between the Monca and Megory — this was 
considered the cream of the county as to location 
soil, and other advantages — instead of being nervous 
over meeting me, the dealers would drive into the 
yard or into the fields,and as I liked to talk, introduce 
the prospective buyers to me and we would engage 
in a long conversation at times. I might add that 
exaggerated tales were current, which related how 

I had run as P— n porter, saved my money, 

come to the Little Crow, bought a half section, 
and was getting rich. The most of the buyers from 
Illinois, Iowa, Minnesota and Nebraska were un- 
used to seeing colored farmers, and my presence 
all alone on the former reserve added to their in- 
terest. In my favor was the fact that my service 

in the employ of the P n Company had taken 

me through nearly every county in the central 
states and therefore, always given to observation, 
I could talk with them concerning the counties they 
had come from. 

Land prices continued to soar. Higher and higher 
they went and to boost them still higher, as well 
as to substantiate the values, the bogy concerning 
insufficient moisture was drowned in the excessive 
rainfall. From April until August it poured, and the 
effect on the growing crops in the east became 
greater still in the way of drowned out corn-fields 
and over-rank stems of small grain that grew to ab- 
normal heights and with the least winds lodged and 
then fell to the ground. The crops on the reserva- 
tion could not have been better and prices were high. 




140 The Conquest 

CHAPTER XXII 

THE PRESIDENT'S PROCLAMATION 

OINCIDENT with the expectation came 
the president's proclamation throwing 
four thousand claims in Tipp county- 
open to settlement under the lottery- 
system at six dollars per acre. Among the towns 
designated in the proclamation where the people 
could make application for a claim, Megory and 
Calias were nearest to the land. These were the 
places where the largest crowds were expected. 
Therefore, the citizens of these two vigorous munic- 
ipalities began extensive preparations to ''entertain 
the crowds." Megory, being more on the country 
order, made more homelike preparations. Among 
the many "conveniences" prepared were a ladies' 
rest room and information bureau, which were lo- 
cated in a large barn previously used for storing 
hay. 

Calias, under the criticism that as soon as the 
road extended farther west it would be as dead as 
Oristowri — now all but forgotten — prepared to 
"get theirs" while the crowds were in town. And 
they did, but that is ahead of the story. 

The time for the opening approached. People 
seemingly from every part of the universe, and from 
every vocation in life, drifted into the towns. 
Among these were included the investors, who stated 
that in the event of a failure to draw they would 
buy deeded land. Next in order were the gamblers, 
from the "tin horn" and "piker" class to the "fat" 




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The Conquest 141 

professionals. Although every precaution was taken 
to keep out the characters of the city's underworld, 
who had characterized former openings, both towns 
were fully represented with a large share of pick- 
pockets, con-men, lewd women and their consorts. 
The many vacant lots on Main street of both the 
towns were decorated with the typical scene at 
land openings. There were little tents with no- 
taries assisted by many beautiful girls to "prepare 
your application/ ' There were many hotels with 
three and four beds to a room, as well as "rooms 
to let" over all the places of business containing 
two stories or more. There were tents with 
five hundred cots, and "lest we forget", there 
were the numerous "drinking fountains," with bars 
the length of the building, behind which were scores 
of bartenders to serve the "how dry I am", on one 
side. On the other, in tents, back rooms and over- 
head could be heard the b-r-r-r-r of the little ivory 
marble as it spun a circuit over the roulette wheel, 
and the luck cages, where the idle sports turned them 
over for their own amusement, to pass away the time. 
The faro-bank and numerous wheels of fortune also 
had a place. From the rear came the strains of 
ragtime music. These were some of the many at- 
tractions that met the trains carrying the first ar- 
rivals on the night of October fifth. 



L 



142 TheConquest 

CHAPTER XXIII 

WHERE THE NEGRO FAILS 

ONG before I came west and during the 
years I had spent on the homestead, my 
closest companion was the magazines. 
From the time Thomas W. Lawson's 
"Frenzied Finance" had run as a serial article in a 
leading periodical, to IdaM. Tarbell's " The History 
of the Standard Oil Company," I fairly devoured 
special articles on subjects of timely interest. I 
enjoyed reading anything that would give me a 
more complete knowledge of what made up this 
great country in which we live and which all Ameri- 
cans are given to boasting of as the "greatest coun- 
try in the world." 

And this brings to my mind certain conditions 
which exist concerning the ten odd millions of the 
black race in America; and more, this, in itself had 
a tendency to open wider the gap between a cer- 
tain class of the race and myself. 

There are two very distinct types or classes, 
among the American negroes. I am inclined to feel 
that this is more prominent than most people are 
aware. I have met and known those who are quick 
to think, practical, conservative as well as progres- 
sive, while there are those who are narrow in their 
sympathies and short-sighted in their views. Now 
as a matter of argument, my experience has taught 
me there are more of this class than most colored 
people have any idea. 

The worst feature of this situation, however, is 



The Conquest 143 

that a large number of the latter class have com- 
mingled with the former in such a way as to easily 
assume all the worthy proportions. They are a 
sort of dog in the manger, and are not in accord 
with any principle that is practical and essential 
to the elimination of friction and strife between the 
races. 

Among the many faults of this class is, that they 
do not realize what it takes to succeed, nor do they 
care, but spend their efforts loudly claiming credit 
for the success of those who are honest in their con- 
victions and try to prove themselves indispen- 
sable citizens. Nothing is more obvious and proves 
this more conclusively than to take notice, as I 
have, of their own selection of reading matter. 

Now, for instance, a few years ago a series of ar- 
ticles under the title of ''Following the Color Line" 
appeared in a certain periodical, the work of a very 
well known writer whose specialty is writing on 
social conditions, strikes, etc. 

In justice to all concerned, the writer described 
the conditions which his articles covered, just as 
he found them and in this, in my opinion, he differed 
largely from many of the southern authors whose 
articles are still inclined to treat the Ethiopians as 
a whole, as the old "time worn" aunt and uncle. 
Not intending to digress, I want to put down here, 
that negroes as a whole are changing to some extent, 
the same as the whites and no liberty-loving 
colored man appreciates being regarded as "aunt,' 
or " uncle' ' even though some of these people were as 
honorable as could be. This is a modern age. 

Now getting back to the discussion that I seem to 



144 The C Vn quest 

have|for the moment forgotten and as regards the 
article, while worthy in every respect, it was no dif- 
ferent in its way from any number of other articles 
published at that time, as well as now, that deal on 
great and complex questions of the day. Yet, this 
article caused thousands of colored people, who never 
before bought a magazine or book, to subscribe for 
that magazine. It was later published in book form 
and is conspicuous in the libraries of many thousands 
of colored families. 

What I have intended to put down in this lengthy 
discourse regarding my race is, if they see or hear 
of an article concerning the race, they will buy that 
magazine, to read the article spoken of and nothing 
more. 

Since living in the state, as a recreation I was in 
the habit of taking trips to Chicago once or twice 
a year, and as might be expected I would talk of 
South Dakota. In the course of a conversation I 
have related a story of some one's success there and 
would be listened to with unusual attention. As I 
had found in them many who were poor listeners, 
at these times when I found myself the object of so 
much undivided attention I would warm up to the 
subject until it had evolved into a sort of lecture, 
and remarks of, "my/' "you don't say so," and " just 
think of it" would interrupt me — "and a colored 
man." No, I would correct, the least bit hesitant, 
a white man. Then, just like the sun disappearing 
behind a cloud, all interest would vanish, further- 
more, I have on occasions of this kind had attention 
of a few minutes before turned to remarks of criticism 
for taking up the time relating the success of a white 




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The Conquest 145 

man. The idea is prevalent among this class that 
all white people should be rich, and regardless of how 
ideal the success has been, I learned that no white 
person could be accepted as an example for this 
class to follow. 

By reading nothing but discussions concerning 
the race, by all but refusing to accept the success of 
the white race as an example and by welcoming any 
racial disturbance as a conclusion that the entire 
white race is bent in one great effort to hold him — 
the negro, down, he can not very well feel the thrill 
of modern progress and is ignorant as to public 
opinion. Therefore he is unable to cope with the 
trend of conditions and has become so condensed 
in the idea that he has no opportunity, that he is 
disin teres ting to the public. One of the greatest 
tasks of my life has been to convince a certain class 
of my racial acquaintances that a colored man can 
be anything. 

Now on the entire Little Crow reservation, less 
than eight hundred miles from Chicago, I was the only 
colored man engaged in agriculture, and moreover, 
from Megory to Omaha, a distance of three hundred 
miles. There was only one other negro family en- 
gaged in the same industry. 

Having lived in the cities, I therefore, was not 
a greenhorn, as some of them would try to have 
me feel, when they referred to their clubs and social 
affairs. 

Among the many facts that confronted me as I 

meditated the situation, one dated back to the time 

I had run on the road. The trains I ran on carried 

thousands monthly into the interior of the north- 

10 



146 The Conquest 

west. Among these were a great number of 
emigrants fresh from the old countries, but there 
was seldom a colored person among them, and those 
few that I had seen, with few exceptions, went on 
through to the Pacific coast cities and engaged in 
the same occupation they had followed in the east. 

During these trips I learned the greatest of all the 
failings were not only among the ignorant class, 
but among the educated as well. Although more 
more agreeable to talk to, they lacked that great 
and mighty principle which characterizes Americans, 
called "the initiative." Colored people are pos- 
sible in every way that is akin to becoming good 
citizens, which has been thoroughly proven and is 
an existing fact. Yet they seem to lack the "guts" 
to get into the northwest and "do things." In 
seven or eight of the great agricultural states there 
were not enough colored farmers to fill a township 
of thirty-six sections. 

Another predominating inconsistency is that 
there is that "love of luxury." They want street 
cars, cement walks, and electric lights to greet them 
when they arrive. I well remember it was something 
near two years before I saw a colored man on the 
reservation, until the road had been extended. They 
had never come west of Oristown, but as the time for 
the opening arrived, the kitchens and hotel dining- 
rooms of Megory and Calias were filled with waiters 
and cooks. 

During the preparation for the opening the com- 
mercial club of Megory had lengthy circulars printed, 
with photographs of the surrounding country, 
farms, homes, and the like, to accompany. These 



The Conquest 147 

circulars described briefly the progress the country 
had made in the four years it had been opened to 
settlement, and the opportunities waiting. By 
giving the name and address the club would send 
these to any address or person, with the statement, 
"by the request" of whoever gave the name. 

I gave the name of not less than one hundred 
persons, and sent them personally to many as well. 
I wrote articles and sent them to different news- 
papers edited by colored people, in the east and other 
places. I was successful in getting one colored per- 
son to come and register — my oldest brother. 




148 The Co rijq u e s t 

CHAPTER XXIV 

"AND THE CROWDS DID COME." THE PRAIRIE FIRE 

|HE registration opened at twelve o'clock 
Monday morning. Seven trains during 
the night before had brought something 
like seven thousand people. Of this 
number about two thousand got off at Megory, and 
the remainder went on through to Calias. The 
big opening was on, and the bid for patronage made 
the relations between the towns more bitter than 
ever. 

After the first few days, however, the crowds, 
with the exception of a few hundred, daily went 
on through to Calias and did not heed the cat calls 
and uncomplimentary remarks from the railway 
platform at Megory. Among these remarks flung 
at the crowded trains were: " Go on to Calias and buy 
a drink of water", "Go on to Calias and pay a 
dime for the water to wash your face" — water was 
one of Calias's scarcities, as will be seen later. 
However, this failed to detract the crowd. 

The C. & R. W. put on fifteen regular trains daily, 
and the little single track, unballasted and squirmy, 
was very unsafe to ride over and the crowded trains 
had to run very slowly on this account. Because 
of the fact that it was difficult to find adequate side 
tracking, it took two full days to make the trip from 
Omaha to Calias and return. 

All the day and night the "toot, toot" of the 
locomotives could be heard and the sound seemed to 
make the country seem very old indeed. Megory's 



The Conquest 149 

brass band — organized for the purpose — undaunted, 
continued to play frantically at the depot to try 
to induce the crowded trains to unload a greater 
share, but to no avail, although the cars were stuffed 
like sandwiches. 

Those times in Calias were long to be remembered. 
As the trains disgorged the thousands daily it seemed 
impossible that the little city could care for 
such crowds. The sidewalks were crowded from 
morn till night. The registration booths and the 
saloons never closed and more automobiles than I 
had ever seen in a country town up to that time, 
roared, and with their clattering noise, took the 
people hurriedly across the reservation to the west. 

Along toward the close of the opening a prairie 
fire driven by a strong west wind raced across Tipp 
county in a straight line for Calias. Although fire 
guards sixty feet wide had been burned along the 
west side of the town, it soon became apparent that 
the fire would leap them and enter the town, unless 
some unusual effort on the part of the citizens was 
made to stop it. 

It was late in the afternoon and as seems always 
the case, a fire will cause the wind to rise, and it 
rose until the blaze shut out the western horizon. 
It seemed the entire world to the west was afire. 

Ten thousand people, lost in sight-seeing, gambling 
and revelry, all of a sudden became aware of the 
approaching danger, and began a rush for safety. 
To the north, south, and east of the town the lands 
were under cultivation, therefore, a safe place from 
the fire that now threatened the town. All business 
was suspended, registration ceased, and the huge 



150 The Conquest 

cans containing more than one hundred thousand 
applications for lands, were loaded on drays and taken 
into the country and deposited in the center of a 
large plowed field, for safety. The gamblers put 
their gains into sacks and joined the surging masses, 
and with grips got from the numerous check rooms, 
all the people fled like stampeding cattle to a position 
to the north of town which was protected by a corn 
field on the west. 

Ernest Nicholson, leading the business men and 
property owners, bravely fought the oncoming 
disaster. The chemical engine and water hose 
were rushed forward but were as pins under the 
drivers of a locomotive. The water from the hose 
ran weakly for a few minutes and then with a blow- 
ing as of an empty faucet, petered out from lack of 
water. The strong wind blew the chemical into the 
air and it proved as useless. The fire entered the 
city. One house, a magnificent residence, was soon 
enveloped in flames, which spread to another, and 
still to another. 

The thousands of people huddled on a bare spot, 
but safe, watched the minature city of one year and 
the gate-way to the homesteads of the next county, 
disappear in flames. 

Megoryites, seeing the danger threatening her 
hated rival five miles away, called for volunteers 
who readily responded and formed bucket brigades, 
loaded barrels into wagons, filled them with water 
and burned the roads in the hurry-up call to the ap- 
parently doomed city. 

I could see the fire from where I was harvesting 
flax ten miles away, and the cloud of smoke, with the 



TheConquest 151 

little city lying silent before, it reminded me of a 
picture of Pompeii before Vesuvius. It looked as 
if Calias were lost. Then, like a miracle, the wind 
quieted down, changed, and in less than twenty 
minutes was blowing a gale from the east, starting 
the fire back over the ground over which it had 
burned. There it sputtered, flickered, and with 
a few sparks went out, just as L. A. Bell pulled onto 
the scene with lathered and bloody eyed mules draw- 
ing a tank of Megory's water, and was told by the 
Nicholson Brothers — who were said to resemble 
Mississippi steamboat roustabouts on a hot day — 
that Calias didn't need their water. 

Following the day of the high wind which brought 
the prairie fire that so badly frightened the people 
of the town, the change of the wind to the east 
brought rain, and about two hundred auto- 
mobiles that had been carrying people over Tipp 
county into the town. I remember the crowds but 
have no idea now many people there were, but that 
it looked more like the crowds on Broadway or 
State street on a busy day than Main Street in a 
burg of the prairie. This was the afternoon of the 
drawing and a woman drew number one, while here 
and there in the crowd that filled the street before 
the registration, exclamations of surprise and delight 
went up from different fortunates hearing their names 
called, drawing a lucky number. I felt rather be- 
wildered by so much excitement and metropolitan- 
ism where hardly two years before I had hauled one 
of the first loads of lumber on the ground to start 
the town. I could not help but feel that the world 
moved swiftly, and that I was living, not in a wilder- 



152 The Conquest 

ness — as stated in some of the letters I had received 
from colored friends in reply to my letter that in- 
formed them of the opening — but in the midst of 
advancement and action. 

When the drawing was over and the crowds had 
gone, it was found that the greatest crowds had 
registered — not at Calias — but at a town just south, 
in Nebraksa, which received forty-five thousand 
while Calias came second with forty-three thousand 
and Megory only received seven thousand, something 
like one hundred fifteen thousand in all having ap- 
applied. 

The hotels in Calias had charged one dollar the 
person and some of the large ones had made small 
fortunes, while the saloons were said to have aver- 
aged over one thousand dollars a day. 

After the opening, land sold like hot hamburger 
sandwiches had a few weeks before. 




The Conquest 153 

CHAPTER XXV 

THE SCOTCH GIRL 

|T had been just four years since I bought 
the relinquishment and seven since leav- 
ing southern Illinois. I had been very 
successful in farming although I had 
made some very poor deals in the beginning, and 
when my crops were sold that season I found I had 
made three thousand, five hundred dollars. Futher- 
more, I had in the beginning sought to secure the 
best land in the best location and had succeeded. 
I had put two hundred eighty acres under cultiva- 
tion, with eight head of horses — I had done a little 
better in my later horse deals — and had machinery, 
seed and feed sufficient to farm it. My efforts in 
the seven years had resulted in the ownership of 
land and stock to the value of twenty thousand dol- 
lars and was only two thousand dollars in debt and 
still under twenty-five years of age. 

During the years I had spent on the Little Crow 
I had "kept batch" all the while until that summer. 
A Scotch family had moved from Indiana that 
spring consisting of the father, a widower, two sons 
and two daughters. One of the boys worked for 
me and as it was much handier, I boarded with them. 
The older of the two girls was a beautiful blonde 
maiden of twenty summers, who attended to the 
household duties, and considering the small op- 
portunities she had to secure an education, was an 
unusually intelligent girl. She had composed some 
verses and songs but not knowing where to send 



154 The Conquest 

them, had never submitted them to a publisher. 
I secured the name of a company that accepted 
some of her writings and paid her fifty dollars for 
them. She was so anxious to improve her mind 
that I took an interest in her and as I received much 
literature in the way of newspapers and magazines 
and read lots of copy-right books, I gave them to 
her. She seemed delighted and appreciated thegifts. 

Before long, however, and without any intention 
of being other than kind, I found myself being drawn 
to her in a way that threatened to become serious. 
While custom frowns on even the discussion of the 
amalgamation of races, it is only human to be kind, 
and it was only my intention to encourage the desire 
to improve, which I could see in her, but I found 
myself on the verge of falling in love with her. To 
make matters more awkward, that love was being 
returned by the object of my kindness. She, how- 
ever, like myself, had no thought of being other 
than kind and grateful. It placed me as well as her 
in an awkward position — for before we realized it, 
we had learned to understand each other to such 
an extent, that it became visible in every look and 
action. 

It reached a stage of embarrassment one day when 
we were reading a volume of Shakespeare. She 
was sitting at the table and I was standing over her. 
The volume was "Othello" and when we came to 
the climax where Othello has murdered his wife, 
driven to it by the evil machinations of Iago, as 
if by instinct she looked up and caught my eyes and 
when I came to myself I had kissed her twice on the 
lips she held up. 



The Conquest 155 

After that, being near her caused me to feel 
awkwardly uncomfortable. We could not even 
look into each other's eyes, without showing the 
feeling that existed in the heart. 

Now during the time I had lived among the white 
people, I had kept my place as regards custom, and 
had been treated with every courtesy and respect; 
had been referred to in the local papers in the most 
complimentary terms, and was regarded as one of 
the Little Crow's best citizens. 

But when the reality of the situation dawned 
upon me, I became in a way frightened, for I did 
not by any means want to fall in love with a white 
girl. I had always disapproved of intermarriage, 
considering it as being above all things, the very 
thing that a colored man could not even think of. 
That we would become desperately in love, however, 
seemed inevitable. 

Lived a man — the history of the American Negro 
shows — who had been the foremost member of 
his race. He had acquitted himself of many hon- 
orable deeds for more than a score of years, in the 
interest of his race. He had filled a federal office 
but at the zenith of his career had brought dis- 
appointment to his race and criticism from the 
white people who had honored him, by marrying 
a white woman, a stenographer in his office. 

They were no doubt in love with each other, which 
in all likelihood overcame the fear of social ostracism, 
they must have known would follow the marriage. 
I speak of love and presume that she loved him for 
in my opinion a white woman, intelligent and 



156 The Conquest 

respectable and knowing what it means, who would 
marry a colored man, must love him and love him 
dearly. To make that love stronger is the feeling 
that haunts the mind; the knowledge that custom, 
tradition, and the dignity of both races are against 
it. Like anything forbidden, however, it arouses 
the spirit of opposition, causing the mind to battle 
with what is felt to be oppression. The sole claim 
is the right to love. 

These thoughts fell upon me like a clap of thunder 
and frightened me the more. It was then too, that 
I realized how pleasant the summer just passed 
had been, and that I had not been in the least lone- 
some, but perfectly contented, aye, happy. And 
that was the reason. 

During the summer when I had read a good 
story or had on mind to discuss my hopes, she had 
listened attentively and I had found companionship. 
If I was melancholy, I had been cheered in the same 
demure manner. Yet, on the whole, I had been un- 
aware of the affection growing silently; drawing two 
lonesome hearts together. With the reality of 
it upon us, we were unable to extricate ourselves 
from our own weak predicament. We tried avoid- 
ing each other; tried everything to crush the weak- 
ness. God has thus endowed. We found it hard. 

I have felt, if a person could only order his mind 
as he does his limbs and have it respond or submit 
to the will, how much easier life would be. For 
it is that relentless thinking all the time until one's 
mind becomes a slave to its own imaginations, that 
brings eternal misery, where happiness might be 
had. 



The Conquest 157 

To love is life — love lives to seek reply — but I 
would contend with myself as to whether or not 
it was right to fall in love with this poor little white 
girl. I contended with myself that there were 
good girls in my race and coincident with this I 
quit boarding with them and went to batching again, 
to try to successfully combat my emotions. I con- 
tinued to send her papers and books to read — I 
could hardly restrain the inclinations to be kind. 
Then one day I went to the house to settle with 
her father for the boy's work and found her alone. 
I could see she had been crying, and her very ex- 
pression was one of unhappiness. Well, what is 
a fellow going to do. What I did was to take 
her into my arms and in spite of all the custom, loy- 
alty, or the dignity of either Ethiopian or the 
Caucasian race, loved her like a lover. 

It was during a street carnival at Megory some- 
time before the Tipp county opening, when one 
afternoon in company with three or four white 
men, I saw a nice looking colored man coming along 
the street. It was very seldom any colored people 
came to those parts and when they did, it was with 
a show troupe or a concert of some kind. When- 
ever any colored people were in town, I had usually 
made myself acquainted and welcomed them — if 
it was acceptable, and it usually was — so when I 
saw this young man approaching I called the atten- 
tion of my companions, saying, "There is a nice- 
looking colored man/' He was about five feet, 
eleven, of a light brown complexion, and chestnut- 
like hair, neatly trimmed. He wore glasses and 



158 The Conquest 

was dressed in a well-fitting suit that matched his 
complexion. He had the appearance of being in- 
telligent and amiable. 

I was in the act of starting to speak, when one 
of the fellows nudged me and whispered in my ear, 
that it was one of the Woodrings from a town a 
short distance away in Nebraska, who was known 
to be of mixed blood but never admitted it. 

According to what I had been told, the father of 
the three boys was about half negro but had married 
a white woman, and this one was the youngest son. 
Needless to say I did not speak but kept clear of 
him. 

There is a difference in races that can be dis- 
tinguished in the features, in the eyes, and even if 
carefully noted, in the sound of the voice. 

It seemed the family claimed to be part Mexican, 
which would account for the darkness of their 
complexion. But I had seen too many different 
races, however, to mistake a streak of Ethiopian. 
Having been in Mexico, I knew them to be al- 
most entirely straight-haired (being a cross be- 
tween an Indian and a Spaniard). When I ob- 
served this young man, I readily distinguished the 
negro features; the brown eyes, the curly hair, and 
the set of the nose. 

The father had come into the sand hills of Ne- 
braska some thirty-five years before, taken a home- 
stead, but from where he came from no one seemed 
to know. It was there he married his white wife, 
and to the union was born the three sons, Frank, 
the eldest, Will, and Len, the youngest. 

The father sold the homestead some twenty 



The Conquest 159 

years before and moved to another county, and had 
run a hotel since in the town of Pencer, where they 
now live. 

Unlike his younger brother, Frank, the eldest son, 
could easily have passed for a white, that is, so 
long as no one looked for the streak. But when the 
fellow whose timely information had kept me from 
embarrassing myself, and perhaps from insulting 
the young man, a few minutes later called out, 
"Hello, Frank !" to a tall man, one look disclosed 
to my scrutiny the negro in his features. I was 
not mistaken. It was Frank Woodring. 

In view of the fact, that in some chapters of this 
story I dwell on the negro, and on account of the 
insistence of many of them who declare they are 
deprived of opportunities on account of. their color, 
I take the privilege of putting down here a sketch of 
this Frank Woodring's life. And although these 
people deny a relation to the negro race, it was 
well known by the public in that part of the coun- 
try, that they were mixed, for it had been told to 
me by every one who knew them, therefore the 
instance cannot be regarded altogether as an ex- 
ception. 

Shortly after coming to Pencer, he went to work 
for an Iowa man on a ranch near by, and later a 
prosperous squaw-man, who owned a bank, took 
him in, where in time he became book-keeper and 
all round handy man, later assistant cashier. The 
ranchman whom Woodring had worked for previous 
to entering the bank, bought the squaw-man out, 
made Woodring cashier, and sold to him a block 
of stock and took his note for the amount. In 



160 The Conquest 

time Woodring proved a good banker and his effi- 
cient management of the institution, which had 
been a State bank with a capital stock of twenty- 
five thousand dollars, had been incorporated into 
a National bank and the capital increased to fifty- 
thousand dollars, and later on to one hundred 
thousand dollars. He dealt in buying and selling 
land as well as feeding cattle, on the side, and had 
prospered until he was soon well-to-do. Coincident 
with this prosperity he had been made president 
of not only that bank — whose footing was near a 
half-million dollars — but of some other three or 
four local banks in Nebraska, also a Megory county 
bank at Fairview — which is the county depository — 
and a large bank and trust company at the town of 
Megory, with a capital stock of sixty thousand dol- 
lars. Today Frank Woodring is one of the wealth- 
iest men in northwest Nebraska. 

The local ball team of their town was playing 
Megory that day, and a few hours later out at the 
ball park, I was shouting for the home team with 
all my breath, the batter struck a foul, and when I 
turned to look where the ball went, there, standing 
on the bench above me, between two white girls, 
and looking down at me with a look that betrayed 
his mind, was Len Woodring. Our eyes met for 
only the fraction of a minute but I read his thoughts. 
He looked away quickly, but I shall not soon forget 
that moment of racial recognition. 

And now when I found my affections in jeopardy 
regarding the love of the Scotch girl, I thought long 
and seriously over the matter, and pictured myself 
in the place of the Woodring family, successful, 













0) 



T3 
P. 



c3 



bfl 

S3 



0> 
> 



TheConquest 161 

respected, and efficient business men, but still 
members] of the down-trodden race. I pondered as 
to whether I could make the sacrifice. Maybe they 
were happy, the boys had never known or associated 
with the race they denied, and maybe were not so 
conscientious as myself, although the look of Len's 
had betrayed what was on his mind. 

I had learned that throughout these Dakotas and 
Nebraska, that other lone colored men who had 
drifted from the haunts and homes of the race, as 
I had — maybe discontented, as I had been — and 
had with time and natural development, through the 
increase in the valuation of their homesteads or 
other lands they had acquired, grown prosperous 
and had finally, with hardly an exception, married 
into the white race. Even the daughter of the only 
colored farmer between the Little Crow and Omaha 
was only prevented from marrying a white man, at 
the altar, when it was found the law of the state 
forbids it. 

I could diagnose their condition by my own. 
Life in a new country is always rough in the begin- 
ning. In the past it had taken ten and fifteen 
years for a newly opened country to develop into 
a state of cultivation and prosperity, that the Little 
Crow had in the four years. 

At the time it had been opened to settlement, 
the reaction from the effects of the dry years and 
hard times of 93-4 and 5 had set in and at that 
time, with plenty of available capital, the early ex- 
tension of the railroad, and other advantages too 
numerous to mention, life had been quite different 
for the settlers. Such advantages had not been 



162 The Conquest 

the lot of the homesteader twenty and thirty years 
before. 

These people had no doubt been honorable and 
had intended to remain loyal to their race, but 
long, hard years, lean crops, and the long, lonesome 
days had changed them. It is easier to control 
the thoughts than the emotions. The craving for 
love and understanding pervades the very core of 
a human, and makes the mind reckless to even such 
a grave matter as race loyalty. In most cases it 
had been years before these people had the means 
and time to get away for a visit to their old homes, 
while around them were the neighbors and friends 
of pioneer days, and maybe, too, some girl had come 
into their lives — like this one had into mine — who 
understood them and was kind and sympathetic. 
What worried me most, however, even frightened 
me, was, that after marriage and when their children 
had grown to manhood and womanhood, they, like 
the Woodring family, had a terror of their race; 
disowning and denying the blood that coursed 
through their veins; claiming to be of some foreign 
descent; in fact, anything to hide or conceal the 
mixture of Ethopian. They looked on me with 
fear, sometimes contempt. Even the mixed-blood 
Indians and negroes seemed to crave a marriage 
with the whites. 

The question uppermost in my mind became, 
'" Would not I become like that, would I too,deny 
my race?" The thought was a desperate one. 
I did not feel that I could become that way, but 
what about those to come after me, would they 
have to submit to the indignities I had seen some 



The Conquest 163 

of these referred to, do, in order that they may marry 
whites and try to banish from memory the relation 
of a race that is hated, in many instances, for no 
other reason than the coloring matter in their pig- 
ment. Would my life, and the thought involved 
and occupied my mind daily, innocent as my life 
now appeared, lead into such straits if I married 
the Scotch girl. It became harder for me, for at 
that time, I had not even a correspondence with 
a girl of my race. As I look back upon it the con- 
dition was a complicated affair. I confess at the 
time, however, that I was on the verge of making 
the sacrifice. This was due to the sights that had 
met my gaze when I would go on trips to Chicago, 
and such times I would return home feeling dis- 
gusted. 




164 The Conquest 

CHAPTER XXVI 

THE BATTLE 

|OME time after the opening it was an- 
nounced from Washington that the 
Land Office, which was located in one 
of the larger towns of the state, about 
one hundred and fifty miles from the Little Crow, 
would be moved to one of the towns in the new 
territory. The Land Office is something like a 
County Seat in bringing business to a town, and 
immediately every town in Megory County began 
a contest for the office. However, it was soon 
seen that it was the intention of the Interior De- 
partment to locate it in either Megory or Calias. 
So the two familiar rivals engaged in another 
battle. But in this Megory held the high card. 

That was about the time the insurgents and stal- 
warts were in a struggle to get control of the State's 
political machinery. It had waxed bitter in the 
June primaries of that year and the insurgents had 
won. Calias had supported the losing candidate, 
who had been overwhelmingly defeated, and both 
senator and one representative in Congress from the 
state were red-hot insurgents. The Nicholson 
Brothers, bowing to tradition, were stand pats. 
Their father had been a stalwart before them in 
Iowa, where Cummins had created so much com- 
motion with his insurgency. 

Ernest, with his wife, had left for the Orient to 
spend the winter. After leaving, the announcement 
came that the land office would be moved. Even had 



The Conquest 165 

he been in Calias the result would likely have been 
the same, but I had a creepy feeling that had he 
been on the ground Megory would have had to 
worked considerably harder at least. 

After sending many men from each town down to 
the National Capital, the towns fought it out. With, 
as I have stated, and which was to be expected, with 
both Senators recommending Megory as having 
advantages over Calias in the way of an abundant 
supply of water and a National Bank with a capital 
stock of fifty thousand dollars, the Interior Depart- 
ment decided in favor of Megory, and Calias lost. 

Ernest, on hearing of the fight, hurriedly returned, 
went in to Washington, secured an appointment 
with the Secretary and is said to have made a worthy 
plea for Calias; but to no avail and the Megoryites 
returned home the heroes of the day. 

I was away at the time, but was told a good share 
of the men of Megory were drunk the greater part 
of the week. 

Some evidence of the rejoicing was visible on my 
return, in the loss of an eye, by a little gambler who 
became too enthusiastic and run up against a 
"snag." What amused me most however, was an 
article written especially for one of the Megory 
papers by a keeper of a racket store and a known 
shouter for the town. The article represented the 
contest as being a big prize fight on the Little Crow 
and read something like this." 



166 The Conquest 

BIG PRIZE FIGHT ON THE LITTLE CROW 
PRINCIPALS 
MEGORY, THE METROPOLIS OF THE 
LITTLE CROW 
REPUTATION, THE SQUARE DEAL 
CALIAS BOASTER 
REPUTATION GRAFTING 
Scene. — Little Crow Reservation. 
Time.— A. D. 190— Referee— Washington, D. 
C. 

Seconds For Megory — Flackler, of the Me- 
gory National. 

Fred Crofton, Postmaster. 
For Calias, Mayor Rosie and A Has-been, 
Formerly of Washington. 

Round one. September. Principals enter the 
ring and refuse to shake hands, referee Washington, 
D. C. announces fight to be straight Marquis of 
Queensbury. No hitting in the clinches, and a 
clean break; a fight to the finish. They are off. 
Calias leads with a left to the face, Megory counter- 
ing with a right to the ribs, they clinch. Referee 
breaks them, then they spar and as the gong sounded 
appeared evenly matched. 

Round two. October. They rush to the center 
of the ring and clinch, referee tells them to break. 
Just as this is done Calias lands a terrific left to 
Megory's jaw following with a right to the body, 
and Megory goes down for the count of nine, getting 
up with much confusion, only to be floored again 
with a right to the temple. Megory rises very 
groggy, when Calias lands a vicious left to the 
mouth, a right to the ear just as the gong sound- 



The Conquest 167 

ed, saving her from a knock-out. They go to their 
corners with betting three to one on Calias and no 
takers. During the one minute's rest the crowd 
whooped it up for Calias, thousands coming her 
way. Megory looked serious, sitting in the corner 
thinking how she had fallen down on some well- 
laid plans. 

Round three. November. They rush to a 
clinch and spar. Referee cautions Calias for but- 
ting. They do some more sparring, and both seem 
cautious, with honors even at the end of the third 
round. 

Round four. December. They rush to the 
center of the ring and begin to spar, then like a 
flash, Megory lands a terrific swing on Calias' jaw, 
following it up with a right to the heart. Calias 
cries foul, but referee orders her to proceed, while 
Megory, with eyes flashing and distended nostrils, 
feints and then like the kick of a mule, lands a hard 
left to the mouth, following in quick succession with 
jolts, swings, jabs and upper cuts. Mayor Rosie 
wants to throw up the sponge, but the referee says 
fight. Megory, with a left to the face and right to 
the stomach, then rushing both hands in a blow to 
the solar plexus, Calias falls and is counted out with 
Megory winning the prize, — Great Land Office. 




168 TheConquest 

CHAPTER XXVII 

THE SACRIFICE — RACE LOYALTY 

lETTING back to the affair of the Scotch 
girl, I hated to give up her kindness and 
friendship. I would have given half 
my life to have had her possess just a 
least bit of negro blood in her veins, but since she 
did not and could not help it any more than I could 
help being a negro, I tried to forget it, straightened 
out my business and took a trip east, bent on finding 
a wife among my own. 

As the early morning train carried me down the 
road from Megory, I hoped with all the hope of 
early manhood, I would find a sensible girl and not 
like many I knew in Chicago, who talked nothing 
but clothes, jewelry, and a good time. I had no 
doubt there were many good colored girls in the 
east, who, if they understood my life, ambition and 
morality, would make a good wife and assist me in 
building a little empire on the Dakota plains, not 
only as a profit to ourselves, but a credit to the negro 
race as well. I wanted to succeed, but hold the 
respect and good will of the community, and there 
are few communities that will sanction a marriage 
with a white girl, hence, the sacrifice. 

I spent about six weeks visiting in Chicago and 
New York, finally returning west to southern 
Illinois to visit a family in C — dale, near M — boro, 
who were the most prosperous colored people in 
the town. They owned a farm near town, nine 
houses and lots in the city, and were practical 



The Conquest 169 

people who understood business and what it took 
to succeed. 

They had a daughter whom I had known as a 
child back in the home town M — plis, where she had 
cousins that she used to visit. She had by this 
time grown into a woman of five and twenty. Her 
name was Daisy Hinshaw. Now Miss Hinshaw was 
not very good-looking but had spent years in school 
and in many ways was unlike the average colored 
girl. She was attentive and did not have her mind 
full of cheap, showy ideals. I had written to her 
at times from South Dakota and she had answered 
with many inviting letters. Therefore, when I 
wrote her from New York that I intended paying 
her a visit, she answered in a very inviting letter, but 
boldly told me not to forget to bring her a nice 
present, that she would like a large purse. I did 
not like such boldness. I should have preferred 
a little more modesty, but I found the purse, how- 
ever, a large seal one in a Fifth Avenue shop, for 
six dollars, which Miss Hinshaw displayed with 
much show when I came to town. 

The town had a colored population of about one 
thousand and the many girls who led in the local 
society looked enviously upon Miss Hinshaw's 
catch — and the large seal purse — and I became the 
"Man of the Hour" in C— dale. 

The only marriageable man in the town who did 
not gamble, get drunk and carouse in a way that 
made him ineligible to decent society, was the pro- 
fessor of the colored school. He was a college 
graduate and received sixty dollars a month. He 
had been spoiled by too much attention, however, 
and was not an agreeable person. 



170 The Conquest 

Miss Hinshaw was dignified and desired to marry, 
and to marry somebody that amounted to some- 
thing, but she was so bold and selfish. She took a 
delight in the reports, that were going the rounds, 
that we were engaged, and I was going to have her 
come to South Dakota and file on a Tipp County 
homestead relinquishment that I would buy, and 
we would then get married. 

The only objector to this plan was myself. I had 
not fallen in love with Miss Hinshaw and did not 
feel that I could. Daisy was a nice girl, however, 
a little odd in appearance, having a light brown 
complexion, without color or blood visible in the 
cheeks; was small and bony; padded with so many 
clothes that no idea of form could be drawn. I 
guessed her weight at about ninety pounds. She had 
very good hair but grey eyes, that gave her a cattish 
appearance. 

She had me walking with her alone and permitted 
no one to interfere. She would not introduce me 
to other girls while out, keeping me right by her 
side and taking me home and into her parlor, with 
her and her alone, as company. 

One day I went up town and while there took a 
notion to go to the little mining town, to see the 
relatives who had got me the job there seven years 
before. But it was ten miles, with no train before 
the following morning. Just then the colored 
caller called out a train to M — boro and St. Louis, 
and all of a sudden it occurred to me that I had 
almost forgotten Miss Rooks. Why not go to 
M — boro? I had not expected to pay her a visit 
but suddenly decided that I would just run over 



The Conquest 171 

quietly and come back on the train to C — dale at 
five o'clock that afternoon. I jumped aboard and 
as M — boro was only eight miles, I was soon in the 
town, and inquiring where she lived. 

I found their house presently — they were always 
moving — and just a trifle nervously rang the bell. 
The door was opened in a few minutes and before 
me stood Jessie. She had changed quite a bit in 
the three years and now with long skirts and the 
eyes looked so tired and dream-like. She was quite 
fascinating, this I took in at a glance. She stam- 
mered out, "Oh! Oscar Dereveaux", extending her 
hand timidly and looking into my eyes as though 
afraid. She looked so lonely, and I had thought 
a great deal of her a few years ago — and perhaps 
it was not all dead — and the next moment she was 
in my arms and I was kissing her. 

I did not go back to C — dale on the five nor on 
the eight o'clock — and I did not want to on the 
last train that night. I was having the most care- 
free time of my life. They were hours of sweetest 
bliss. With Jessie snugly held in the angle of my 
left arm, we poured out the pent-up feelings of the 
past years. I had a proposition to make, and had 
reasons to feel it would be accepted. 

The family had a hard time making ends meet. 
Her father had lost the mail carrier's job and had 
run a restaurant later and then a saloon. Failing 
in both he had gone to another town, starting 
another restaurant and had there been assaulted 
by a former admirer of Jessie's, who had struck him 
with a heavy stick, fracturing the skull and injuring 
him so that for weeks he had not been able to 



172 The Conquest 

remember anything. Although he was then con- 
valescing, he was unable to earn anything. Her 
mother had always been helpless, and the support 
fell on her and a younger brother, who acted as 
special delivery letter carrier and received twenty 
dollars a month, while Jessie taught a country 
school a mile from town, receiving twenty-five dol- 
lars per month. This she turned over to the sup- 
port of the household, and made what she earned 
sewing after school hours, supply her own needs. 
It was a long and pitiful tale she related as we 
walked together along a dark street, with her cling- 
ing to my arm and speaking at times in a half sob. 
My heart went out to her, and I wanted to help 
and said: "Why did you not write to me, didn't 
you know that I would have done something?" 

"Well/' she answered slowly, "I started to 
several times, but was so afraid that you would 
not understand." She seemed so weak and forlorn 
in her distress. She had never been that way when 
I knew her before, and I felt sure she had suffered, 
and I was a brute 2 not to have realized it. Twelve 
o'clock found me as reluctant to go as five o'clock 
had, but as we kissed lingeringly at the door, I 
promised when I left C — dale two evenings later 
I would stop off at M — boro and we would discuss 
the matter pro and con. This was Saturday night. 

The next morning I called to see Daisy. I was 
unusually cheerful, and taking her face in my hands, 
blew a kiss. She looked up at me with her grey 
eyes alert and with an air of suspicion, said: "You've 
been kissing somebody else since you left here." 
Then leading me into the parlor in her commanding 



The Conquest 173 

way, ordered me to sit down and to wait there until 
she returned. She had just completed cleaning 
and dusting the parlor and it was in perfect order. 
She seemed to me to be more forward than ever 
that morning, and I felt a suspicion that I was going 
to get a curtain lecture. However, I escaped the 
lecture but got stunned instead. 

Daisy returned in about an hour, dressed in a 
rustling black silk dress, with powdered face and her 
hair done up elegantly and without ceremony or 
hesitation planted herself on the settee and requested, 
or rather ordered me to take a seat beside her. 
She opened the conversation by inquiring of South 
Dakota, and took my hand and pretended to pare 
my finger nails. I answered in nonchalant tones 
but after a little she turned her head a little slant- 
ingly, looked down, began just the least hesitant, 
but firmly: "Now what arrangements do you wish 
me to make in regard to my coming to South 
Dakota next fall?" 

For the love of Jesus, I said to myself, if she 
hasn't proposed. Now one advantage of a dark 
skin is that one does not show his inner feeling 
as noticeably as those of the lighter shade, and 
I do not know whether Miss Hinshaw noticed the 
look of embarrassment that overspread my coun- 
tenance. I finally found words to break the deadly 
suspense following her bold action. 

"Oh!" I stammered more than spoke, "I would 
really rather not make any arrangements, Daisy." 

"Well," she said, not in the least taken back, "a 
person likes to know just how they stand." 

"Yes", of course, I added hastily." "You see," 



174 TheConquest 

I was just starting in on a lengthy discourse trying 
to avoid the issue, when the door bell rang and 
a relative of mine by the name of Menloe Robinson, 
who had attended the university the same time 
Miss Hinshaw had, but had been expelled for 
gambling and other bad habits, came in. He was 
a bore most of the time with so much of his college 
talk, but I could have hugged him then, I felt so 
relieved, but Miss Hinshaw put in before he got 
started to talking, wickedly, that of course if I 
did not want her she could not force it. 

The next day at noon I left for St. Louis but did 
not mention that I was scheduled to stop off at 
M — boro. Miss Hinshaw had grown sad in ap- 
pearance and looked so lonely I felt sorry for her 
and kissed her good-bye at the station, which 
seemed to cheer her a little. She was married to a 
classmate about a year later and I have not seen 
her since. 

Jessie was glad to see me when I called that even- 
ing in M — boro, and we went walking again and had 
another long talk. When we got back, I sang the 
old story to which she answered with, "Do you 
really want me?" 

"Sure, Jessie, why not." I looked into her eyes 
that seemed just about to shed tears but she closed 
them and snuggled up closely, and whispered, 
"I just wanted to hear you say you wanted me." 




The Conquest 175 

CHAPTER XXVIII 

THE BREEDS 

j]ERE the story may have ended, that is, 
had I taken her to the minister, but as 
everybody had gone land crazy in 
Dakota and I had determined to own 
more land myself, I told her how I could buy a 
relinquishment and she could file on it and then 
we would marry at once. Now when a young man 
and a girl are in love and feel each other to be the 
world and all that's in it, it is quite easy to plan, 
and Miss Rooks and I were no exception. Had we 
been in South Dakota instead of Southern Illinois, 
and had it been the month of October instead of 
January, nine months before, we would have carried 
out our plans, but since it was January we mutually 
agreed to wait until the nine months had elapsed, 
but something happened during that time which 
will be told in due time. 

I enjoyed feeling that I was at last engaged. It 
was positively delightful, and when I left the next 
morning to visit my parents in Kansas, I was a 
very happy person. While visiting there, shooting 
jack-rabbits by day and boosting Dakota to the 
Jayhawkers half the night, I'd write to Miss Rooks 
sometime during each twenty-four hours, and for 
a time received a letter as often. Two sisters were 
to be graduated from the high school the following 
June, and wanted to come to Dakota in the fall and 
take up claims, but had no money to purchase 
relinquishments. I agreed to mortgage my land 



176 The Conquest 

and loan the money, but when all was arranged it 
was found one of them would not be old enough in 
time, so my grandmother, who had always possessed 
a roving spirit, wanted to come and so it was settled. 

When I got back to Dakota and jumped into my 
spring work it was with unusual vigor and con- 
templation, and all went well for a while. Soon, 
however, I failed to hear from Jessie and began to 
feel a bit uneasy. When three weeks had passed 
and still no letter, I wrote again asking why she did 
not answer my letters. In due time I heard from 
her stating that she had been afraid I didn't love 
her and that she had been told I was engaged to 
Daisy, and as Daisy would be the heir to the money 
and property of her parents she felt sure my mar- 
riage to Miss Hinshaw would be more agreeable 
to me than would a marriage with her, who had 
only a kind heart and willing mind to offer, so she 
had on the first day of April married one whom she 
felt was better suited to her impoverished condition. 

Now, what she had done was, in her effort to 
break off the prolonged courtship of the little fellow 
referred to in the early part of this story (and who 
was still working for three dollars a week), she had 
commenced going with another — a cook forty-two 
years of age, and had thought herself desparately 
in love with him at the time. I had not even 
written to Miss Hinshaw and knew nothing what- 
ever of any engagement. I was much downcast 
for a time, and like some others who have been 
jilted, I grew the least bit wicked in my thoughts, 
and felt she would not find life all sunshine and 
roses with her forty-two-year-old groom. Lots 



The Conquest 177 

of excitement was on around Megory and Calias, 
and as I liked excitement, I soon forgot the matter. 

With the location of the land office in Megory 
and its subsequent removal from east of the Mis- 
souri, it was found there was only one building in 
the town, outside of the banks, that contained a 
vault, and a vault being necessary, it became ex- 
pedient for the commercial club to provide an 
office that contained one. Two prosperous real- 
estate dealers, whose office contained a vault, 
readily turned over their building to the register 
and receiver until the land office building, then 
under construction, should be completed. A build- 
ing twenty-five by sixty feet was built in the street 
just in front of the office, to be used as a temporary 
map room, and to be moved away as soon as the 
filing was over. 

The holders of lucky numbers had been requested 
to appear at a given hour on a certain day to offer 
filings on Tipp county claims. By the time the 
filing had commenced, the hotels of both towns 
were filled, and tents covered all the vacant lots, 
while one hundred and fifty or more autos, to be 
hired at twenty-five dollars per day, did a rushing 
business. The settlers seemed to be possessed of 
abundant capital, and deposits in the local banks 
increased out of all proportion to those of previous 
times. 

Besides the holders of numbers, hundreds of other 
settlers, who had purchased land in Megory county, 
were moving in at the same time, bringing stock, 
machinery, household goods and plenty of money. 



12 



178 The Conquest 

Those were bountiful days for the locators and 
land sharks. 

When Megory county opened for settlement a 
few years previous, it was found that the Indians 
had taken practically all their allotments along the 
streams, where wood and water were to be had. 
The most of these allotments were on the Monca 
bottom below Old Calias. In fact, they had taken 
the entire valley that far up. The timber along 
the creek was very small, being stunted from many 
fires, and consisted mostly of cottonwood, elm, 
box-elder, oak and ash. All but the oak and ash 
being easily susceptible to dry rot, were unfit for 
posts or anything except for shade and firewood. 
This made the valley lands cheaper than the up- 
lands. 

The Indians were always selling and are yet, 
what is furnished them by the government, for all 
they can get. When given the money spends it as 
quickly as he possibly can, buying fine horses, buggies, 
whiskey, and what-not. Their only idea being that 
it is to spend. The Sioux Indians, in my opinion, 
are the wealthiest tribe. They owned at one time 
the larger part of southern South Dakota and north- 
ern Nebraska, and own a lot of it yet. Be it said, 
however, it is simply because the government will 
not allow them to sell. 

The breeds near Old Calias were easily flattered, 
and when the white people invited them to anything 
they always came dressed in great regalia, but after 
the settlers came there was not much inter-marry- 
ing, such as there had been before. A family of 
mixed-bloods by the name of Cutschal), owned 



The Conquest 179 

all the land just south of Old Calias, in fact the site 
where Calias had stood, was formerly the allot- 
ment of a deceased son. The father, known as 
old Tom Cutschall, was for years a landmark on 
the creek. 

Now and then Nicholson Brothers had invited 
the Cutschalls to some of their social doings, which 
made the Cutschalls feel exalted, and higher still, 
when Ernest suggested he could get them a patent 
for their land and then would buy it. This suited 
Cutschalls dandy. Ernest offered seven thousand 
dollars for the section, and they accepted. At that 
time, by recommending the Indian to be a competent 
citizen and able to care for himself, a patent would 
be granted on proper recommendation, and Nichol- 
son Brothers attended to that and got Mrs. Cutschall 
the patent. Tom, her husband, being a white 
man, could not be allotted, and she had been given 
the section as the head of the family. It is said 
they spent the seven thousand dollars in one year. 
The company of which the father of the Nicholson 
Brothers was president made a loan of eight thou- 
sand dollars on the land, and shortly afterward 
they sold it for twenty-three thousand dollars. 
The lots had brought more than one hundred 
thousand dollars in Calias and were still selling, so 
this placed the " Windy Nicholsons/' as they had 
been called by jealous Megoryites, in a position of 
much importance, and they were by this time recog- 
nized as men of no small ability. 

Years before Megory county was opened to settle- 
ment, many white men had drifted onto the reser- 
vation and had engaged in ranching, and had in 



180 The Conquest 

the meantime married squaws. This appears to 
have been done more by the French than any other 
nationality, judging by the many French names 
among the mixed-bloods. Among these were a 
family by the name of Amoureaux, consisting of 
four boys and several girls. The girls had all 
married white men, and the little while Old Calias 
was in existence, two of the boys, William and 
George, used to go there often and were entertained 
by the Nicholson Brothers with as much splendor 
as Calias could afford. The Amoureaux were high 
moguls in Little Crow society during the first two 
years and everybody took off their hats to them. 
They were called the "rich mixed-bloods/ ' and were 
engaged in ranching and owned great herds in Tipp 
county. When they shipped it was by the train- 
loads. The Amoureaux and the Colones, another 
family of wealthy breeds, were married to white 
women, and the husbands, as heads of families, held 
a section of land and the children each held one 
hundred and sixty acres. 

Before the Nicholson Brothers had left Old 
Calias and before they had reached the position 
they now occupied, as I stated, they had shown the 
Amoureaux a "good time." They did not have 
much Indian blood in their veins, being what are 
called quarter-breeds, having a French father and 
a half-blood Indian mother, and were all fine look- 
ing. George had seven children and the family 
altogether had eleven quarter sections of land and 
two thousand head of cattle, so there was no reason 
why he should not have been the "big chief/' but 
so much society and paid-for notoriety had brought 



The Conquest 181 

about a change to him and his brother. William, 
who had always been a money-maker and a still 
bigger spender, with the fine looks thrown in, had 
shown like a skyrocket before bursting. 

A rich Indian is something worth associating 
with, but a poor one is of small note. The Amour- 
eaux spent so freely that in a few years they were 
all in, down and out — had nothing but their allot- 
ments left, and these the government would not 
give patents to, the Colones had done likewise, and 
together they had all moved into Tipp county. 

Now there was another Amoureaux, the oldest 
one of the boys, who like the others had "blowed 
his roll," but happened to have an allotment in 
the very picturesque valley of the Dog Ear, in Tipp 
county, near the center of the county, and when a 
bunch of promoters decided to lay out a town they 
made a deal with Oliver, taking him into the com- 
pany, he furnishing the land and they the brains. 
They laid out the site and began the town, naming 
it "Amoureaux" in honor of the breed, which made 
Oliver feel very big, indeed. 




182 The Conquest 

CHAPTER XXIX 

IN THE VALLEY OF THE DOG EAR 

|HE boom in Megory and Calias took 
such proportions that it made every 
investor prosperous, a goodly number 
of whom sold out, settled in Amoureaux, 
and the beautiful townsite soon became one of 
the most popular trade centers in the new county. 
It was the only townsite where trees stood, and 
the. investors thought it a great thing that they 
would not have to wait a score of years to grow them. 
Among the money investors in the town was old 
Dad Durpee, the former Oristown and Megory stage 
driver. When talking with him one day he told 
me he had saved three thousand dollars while run- 
ning the stage line and had several good horses 
besides. "Dad," as he was familiarly called, had 
invested a part of his bank account in a corner 
lot and put up a two-story building, and soon 
became an Amoureaux booster. Old " Dad " opened 
up a stage line between Calias and the new town, 
but this line did not pay as well as the old one, for 
no one rode with him except when the weather was 
bad, as the people were all riding now in automo- 
biles. In a short time every line of business was 
represented in Amoureaux and when the settlers 
began to arrive, Amoureaux did a flourishing business. 
In coming from Calias, the trail led over a mon- 
strous hill, and from the top "Amro," the name 
having been shortened, nestling in the valley below, 
reminding me of Mexico City as it appeared from 



The Conquest 183 

the highlands near Cuernavaca. A party from 
Hedrick, by the name of Van Neter, built a hotel 
fifty by one hundred feet, with forty rooms, and 
during the opening and filing made a small fortune. 
The house was always full and high prices were 
charged, and thus Amro prospered. 

During the month of April the promoters suc- 
ceeded in having the governor call an election 
to organize the county, the election to be held in 
June following. The filing had been made in April 
and May, and as conditions were, no one could 
vote except cowboys, Indians and mixed-bloods. 
In the election Amro won the county seat, and 
settlers moving into the county were exceedingly 
mortified over the fact, having to be governed 
eighteen months by an outlaw set who had deprived 
them of a voice in the organization of the county. 
As Amro had won, it soon became the central city 
and grew, as Calias had grown, and in a short time 
had a half-dozen general stores, two garages, four 
hotels, four banks, and every other line of business 
that goes to make up a western town. Its four 
livery barns did all the business their capacity would 
permit, while the saloons and gamblers feasted on 
the easy eastern cash that fell into their pockets. 
In July the lot sales of the government towns were 
held, but only one amounted to much, that town 
being farthest west and miles from the eastern line 
of the county. This was Ritten, and under a 
ruling of the Interior Department, a deposit of 
twenty-five dollars was accepted on an option of 
sixty days, after which a payment of one-half the 
price of the lot was required. Here it must be said 



184 The Conquest 

that almost every dollar invested on the Little Crow 
had been doubled in a short time, and in many 
instances a hundred dollars soon grew to a thousand 
or more. 

Practically all the lowest number holders had 
filed around Ritten, including numbers one and two. 
Ever since the opening of Oklahoma in 1901, when 
number one took a claim adjoining the city of 
Lawton, and the owner is said to have received 
thirty thousand dollars for it, the holder of number 
one in every opening of western land since has been 
a very conspicuous figure, and this was not lost on 
the holder of number one in Tipp county — who was 
a divorced woman. She took her claim adjoining 
the town of Ritten, which fact brought the town 
considerable attention. The lots in the town 
brought the highest price of any which had been 
sold in any town on the Little Crow, up to that time, 
several having sold for from one thousand, two hun- 
dred to one thousand, four hundred dollars and one 
as high as two thousand and fifty dollars. 

The town of Amro, being surrounded by Indian 
allotments, had few settlers in its immediate vicinity. 
The Indians, profiting by their experience in Me- 
gory county, where they learned that good location 
meant increase in the value of their lands, had, in 
selecting allotments, taken nearly all the land just 
west of Amro, as they had taken practically all of 
the good land just west of Calias in the eastern part 
of Tipp county. The good land all over the county 
had been picked over and the Indians had selected 
much of the best, but Tipp county is a large one, 
and several hundred thousand acres of good land 



The Conquest 185 

were available for homesteading, though much 
scattered as to location. 

When July arrived and still no surveyors for the 
railroad company had put in their appearance, it 
was feared that no extension work would be com- 
menced that year, but shortly after the lot sale at 
Ritten, the surveyors arrived in the county and ran 
a survey west from Calias eleven miles to a town 
named after the Colones, referred to, striking the 
town, then proceeding northwest, missing Amro 
and crossing the Dog Ear about two miles north of 
the town, then following a divide almost due west 
to the county line on the west, running just south 
of a conspicuous range of hills known as the "Red 
Hills/ ' missing every town in the county except 
Colone. This caused a temporary check in the 
excitement around Amro, but as it had the county 
seat it felt secure, as a county seat means much to 
a western village, and felt the railroad would event- 
ually go there. In fact the citizens of the town boast- 
ed that the road could not afford to miss it, pointing 
with pride to the many teams to be seen in her 
streets daily and the bee-like activity of the town 
in general. I visited the town many times, but 
from the first time I saw the place I felt sure the 
railroad would never go there as two miles to the 
north was the natural divide, that the survey had 
followed all the way from Colone to the Dog Ear 
and on to the west side of the county, which is 
a natural right-of-way. When I argued with the 
people in the town, that Amro would not get the 
railroad, I brought out a storm of protest. 




186 The Conquest 

CHAPTER XXX 

ERNEST NICHOLSON TAKES A HAND 

jjFTER completing the first survey, how- 
ever, the surveyors returned, and made 
another that struck Amro. This survey 
swerved off from the first survey to the 
southwest between Colone and Amro and struck 
the valley of a little stream known as Mud Creek, 
which empties into the Dog Ear at Amro. But 
being a most illogical route, I felt confident the 
C. & R. W. had no intention of following it, perhaps 
only making the survey out of courtesy to the people 
in Amro, or possibly to show to the state railroad 
commissioners, if they became insistent, why they 
could not strike the town. 

About this time Ernest Nicholson appeared on 
the scene, and purchased a forty acre tract of land 
north of the town, for which he paid fifty-five dollars 
an acre, later paying ten thousand dollars for a 
quarter, joining the forty. Still later he purchased 
the entire section of heirship land, belonging to a 
man named Jim Riggins, an Oristown city justice, 
and a former squaw-man, whose deceased wife had 
owned the land. For this section of land the 
Nicholsons paid thirty-five thousand dollars. The 
price staggered the people of Amro, who declared 
Nicholson had certainly gone crazy. They set 
up a terrible "howl." "What were the d — Nichol- 
sons sticking their noses into Tipp county towns 
for? Were they not satisfied with Calias, where 
they had grafted everybody out of their money?" 



The Conquest 187 

No, the trouble, they all agreed, was that Ernest 
wanted to run the country and wanted to be the 
"big stick." But they consoled themselves for 
awhile with the fact that Amro had the county seat 
and was growing. The settlers were trading in 
Amro, for Amro had what they needed. An in- 
dignation meeting was held, where with much feel- 
ing they denounced the actions of Ernest Nicholson 
in buying land north of the town and announcing 
that he would build a town such as the Little Crow 
had nevei; dreamed of, and that Amro should at 
once begin to move over to the new townsite and 
save money; but they were hot. Old Dad Durpee, 
in his shirt sleeves, corduroy and boots, his shaggy 
beard flowing, declared that the low-down, stinking, 
lying cuss would not dare to ask him to move to 
the town he had as yet not even named; but Ernest, 
at the wheel of a big new sixty-horse power Packard, 
continued to buy land along the railroad survey 
all the way to the west line of the county. In fact 
he bought every piece of land that was purchasable. 
I watched this fight from the beginning, with 
interest, for I had become well enough acquainted 
with Ernest to feel that he knew what he was about. 
When the surveyors had arrived in Calias, Ernest 
had gone to Chicago. In declaring the road could 
not miss Amro the people were much like inhabi- 
tants of Megory had been a few years before. While 
they prattled and allowed their ego to rule, they 
should have been busy, and when it was seen that 
the town might not get the railroad, they should 
have gone to Chicago and seen Marvin Hewitt, 
putting the proposition squarely before him, and 



188 The Conquest 

requested that if he could not give them the road, to 
give them a depot, if they moved to the line of the 
survey. By that time it was a town with two solid 
blocks of business houses and many good merchants 
and bankers. I often wondered how such men 
could be so pinheaded, sitting back, declaring the 
great C. & R. W. railway could not afford to miss 
a little burg like Amro, but from previous observa- 
tions and experience I felt sure they would wait 
until the last dog was dead, before trying to see 
what they could do. And they did. 

In the meantime the promoters, who were 
nearly all from Megory or somewhere in Megory 
county, had learned that Ernest Nicholson was 
nobody's fool. They hooted the Nicholsons, along 
with the rest of the town, declaring Ernest to be 
anything but what he really was, until they had 
roused enough excitement to make Amro seem like 
a "good thing/' Then they quietly sold their 
interest to the Amoureaux Brothers, who raked up 
about all that was left of the fortune of a few years 
previous, and paid six thousand, six hundred dollars 
for the interest of the promoters which made the 
Amoureaux the sole owners of the townsite and 
placed them in obvious control of the town's affairs, 
and again in the white society they liked so well. 

All the Calias lumber yards owned branch yards 
at Amro and everybody continued to do a flourish- 
ing business. The Amroites paid little attention 
to the platting of the townsite to the north, nor 
made a single effort to ascertain which survey the 
railroad would follow, but continued to boast that 
Amro would get the road. About this time Ernest 



The Conquest 189 

Nicholson called a meeting in Amro, inviting all 
the business men to be present and hear a proposi- 
tion that he had to make, stating he hoped the 
citizens of the town and himself could get together 
without friction or ill-feeling. The meeting was 
held in Durpee's hall and everybody attended; 
some out of curiosity, some out of fear, and but 
few with any expectation or intention of agreeing 
to move to the north townsite. Ernest addressed 
the meeting, first thanking them for their presence, 
then plunged headlong into the purpose of the 
meeting. He explained that it was quite impos- 
sible for the road to go to Amro, this he had feared 
before a survey was made, but that he had ascer- 
tained while in Chicago that the road would not 
strike Amro. He then read a letter from Marvin 
Hewitt, the " man of destiny," so far as the location 
of the railroad was concerned, which stated that the 
road would be extended and the depot would be 
located on section twenty, which was the section 
Ernest had purchased. Then he brought up the 
matter of the distribution of lots which was, that 
to every person who moved or began to move to 
the new townsite within thirty days, one-half of the 
purchase price of the lot would be refunded. The 
price of the business lots ranged from eight hundred 
to two thousand dollars, while residence lots were 
from fifty to three hundred. " Think it over," he 
said, in closing, and was gone. 

Needless to say they paid little attention to the 
proposition. The Amro Journal "roasted" and 
cartooned the Nicholson Brothers in the same way 
Megory papers had done, on account of the town of 
Calias. 



190 The Conquest 

After thirty days had elapsed, the Nicholsons 
warned the people of Amro that it was the last 
opportunity they would have to accept his proposi- 
tion, and when they paid no attention to his warning, 
he named the new town. I shall not soon forget 
how the people outside of the town of Amro laughed 
over the name applied to the new town, as its appli- 
cation to the situation was so accurate and descrip- 
tive of later events, that I regret I must substitute 
a name for the purposes of this story, but which is 
the best I am able to find, " Victor/' 

Instead of moving to Victor, taking advantage 
of choice of location and the purchase of a lot at 
half price, the Amroites began making improve- 
ments in their town, putting down cement walks 
ten feet wide the length of the two business blocks 
and walks on side streets as well. A school election 
was called and as a result an eleven-thousand-dollar 
school house was erected, a modern two-story build- 
ing, with basement and gymnasium. The building 
was large enough to hold all the population of Amro 
if all the men, women and children were of school 
age, and still have room for many more. This act 
brought a storm of criticism from the settlers, and 
even many of the people of the town thought it 
quite a needless extravagance; but Van Neter, who 
was strong for education and for Amro, had put 
it through and figured he had won a point. He was 
the county superintendent. Most of the people 
claimed the town would soon grow large enough 
to require the building, and let it go at that. 

People began drifting into Victor, buying lots 
and putting up good buildings. Nicholsons an- 



TheConquest 191 

nounced a lot sale and preparations began for much 
active boosting for the new town. In the election 
to be held a year later, they hoped to wrest the 
county seat from Amro. 

When Ernest Nicholson saw the improvements 
being made in Amro and no sign of moving the 
town, he began to scheme, and I could see that if 
Amro wasn't going to move peacefully he would 
help it along in some other way. However, nothing 
was done before the lot sale, which was advertised 
to take place in the lobby of the Nicholson Brothers' 
new office building in Calias. 

On the date advertised for the lot sale, crowds 
gathered and many who had no intentions of in- 
vesting, attended the sale out of curiosity. I took 
a crowd to Calias from Megory, among whom was 
Joy Flackler, cashier of the Megory National Bank, 
who stated that Frank Woodring had loaned the 
Nicholsons fifty thousand dollars to buy the town- 
site. Megoryites still held a grudge against the 
Nicholsons, and Flackler seemed to wish they had 
asked the loan of him so he might have had the 
pleasure of turning them down. 

The second day of the lot sale, a bunch of bar- 
tenders, gamblers and Amro's rougher class ap- 
peared on the scene and distributed handbills which 
announced that Amro had contracted for a half 
section on the survey north of the town and would 
move in a body if moving was necessary. The 
crowd styled themselves "Amro knockers," whose 
purpose it was to show prospective lot buyers that 
in purchasing Victor lots they were buying "a pig 
in a poke." The knocking was done mostly in 



192 The Conquest 

saloons, where the knockers got drunk and were 
promptly arrested before the sale started. The 
sale went along unhindered. The auctioneer, stand- 
ing above the crowds, waxed eloquent in pointing 
out the advantages, describing Sioux City on the 
east and Deadwood and Lead on the west, and 
explaining that eventually a city must spring up 
in that section of the country, that would grow into 
a prairie metropolis of probably ten thousand 
people, and whether the crowd before him took his 
eloquence seriously or not, they at least had the 
chance at the choice of the lots and locations, and 
eighty-four thousand dollars worth of lots were 
sold. 




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The Conquest 193 

CHAPTER XXXI 

THE M'CRALINES 

|S before mentioned, I was given largely 
to observation and to reading and was 
fairly well posted on current events. 
I was always a lover of success and 
nothing interested me more after a day's work in 
the field than spending my evening hours in reading. 
What I liked best was some good story with a moral. 
I enjoyed reading stories by Maude Radford War- 
ren, largely because her stories were so very practical 
and true to life. Having traveled and seen much 
of the country, while running as a porter for the 

P n Company, I could follow much of her 

writings, having been over the ground covered by 
the scenes of many of her stories. Another feature 
of her writings which pleased me was the fact that 
many of the characters, unlike the central figures 
in many stories, who all become fabulously wealthy, 
were often only fairly successful and gained only 
a measure of wealth and happiness, that did not 
reach prohibitive proportions. 

Perhaps I should not have become so set against 
stories whose heroes invariably became multi- 
millionaires, had it not been for the fact that many 
of the younger members of my race, with whom I 
had made acquaintance in my trips to Chicago 
and other parts of the country, always appeared to 
intimate in their conversation, that a person should 
have riches thrust upon them if they sacrificed all 
their "good times," as they termed it, to go out 
13 



194 T|h e Conquest 

west. Of course the easterner, in most stories, 
conquers and becomes rich, that is, after so much 
sacrifice. The truth is, in real life only about one 
in ten of the eastern people make good at ranching 
or homesteading, and that one is usually well 
supplied with capital in the beginning, though of 
course there are exceptions. Colored people are 
much unlike the people of other races. For in- 
stance, all around me in my home in Dakota were 
foreigners of practically all nations, except Italians 
and Jews, among them being Swedes, Norwegians, 
Danes, Assyrians from Jerusalem, many Austrians, 
some Hungarians, and lots of Germans and Irish, 
these last being mostly American born, and also 
many Russians. The greater part of these people 
are good farmers and were growing prosperous 
on the Little Crow, and seeing this, I worked the 
harder to keep abreast of them, if not a little ahead. 
This was my fifth year and still there had not been 
a colored person on my land. Many more settlers 
had some and Tipp county was filling up, but still 
no colored people. My white neighbors had many 
visitors from their old homes and but few but had 
visitors at some time to see them and see what they 
were doing. 

During my visit to Kansas the spring previous, 
I had found many prosperous colored families, most 
of whom had settled in Kansas in the seventies 
and eighties and were mostly ex-slaves, but were not 
like the people of southern Illinois, contented and 
happy to eke a living from the farm they pretended 
to cultivate, but made their farms pay by careful 
methods. The farms they owned had from a 



The Conquest 195 

hundred and sixty acres to six hundred and forty 
acres, and one colored man there at that time owned 
eleven hundred acres with twelve thousand dollars in 
the bank. 

Wherever I had been, however, I had always 
found a certain class in large and small towns alike 
whose object in life was obviously nothing, but 
who dressed up and aped the white people. 

After Miss Rooks had married I was again in the 
condition of the previous year, but during the sum- 
mer I had written to a young lady who had been 
teaching in M — boro and whom I had met while 
visiting Miss Rooks. Her name was Orlean Mc- 
Craline, and her father was a minister and had 
been the pastor of our church in M — pis when I 
was a baby, but for the past seventeen years had 
been acting as presiding elder over the southern 
Illinois district. Miss McCraline had answered 
my letters and during the summer we had been 
very agreeable correspondents, and when in Sep- 
tember I contracted for three relinquishments of 
homestead filings, I decided to ask her to marry 
me but to come and file on a Tipp county claim 
first. 

To get the money for the purchase of the relin- 
quishments, I had mortgaged my three hundred 
and twenty acres for seven thousand, six hundred 
dollars, the relinquishments costing in the neigh- 
borhood of six thousand, four hundred dollars. 
October was the time when the land would be 
open to homestead filing, and Miss McCraline had 
written that she would like to homestead. After 
sending my sister and grandmother the money to 



196 The Conquest 

come to Dakota, I went to Chicago, where I arrived 
one Saturday morning. I had, since being in the 
west, stopped at the home of a maiden lady about 
thirty-five years of age, and in talking with her I 
had occasion to speak of the family. Evidently 
she did not know I had come to see Orlean, or that 
I was even acquainted with the family. I spoke 
of the Rev. McCraline and asked her if she knew 
him. 

"Who, old N. J. McCraline?" she asked. 
" Humph, " she went on with a contemptuous snort. 
"Yes, I know him and know him to be the biggest 
old rascal in the Methodist church. He's lower 
than a dog/' she continued, "and if it wasn't for 
his family they would have thrown him out of the 
conference long ago, but he has a good family and 
for that reason they let him stay on, but he has no 
principle and is mean to his wife, never goes out 
with her nor does anything for her, but courts every 
woman on his circuit who will notice him and has 
been doing it for years. When he is in Chicago he 
spends his time visiting a woman on the west side. 
Her name is Mrs. Ewis." 

This recalled to my mind that during the spring 
I had come to Chicago I had become acquainted 
with Mrs. Ewis' son and had been entertained at 
their home on Vernon Avenue where at that time 
the two families, McCraline and Ewis, rented a flat 
together, and although I had seen the girls I had 
not become acquainted with any of the McCraline 
family then. Orlean was the older of the two girls. 
What Miss Ankin had said about her father did not 
sound very good for a minister, still I had known 



The Conquest 197 

in southern Illinois that the colored ministers 
didn't always bear the best reputations, and some of 
the colored papers I received in Dakota were con- 
tinually making war on the immoral ministers, but 
since I had come to see the girl it didn't discourage 
me when I learned her father had a bad name al- 
though I would have preferred an opposite condition. 

I went to the phone a few minutes after the con- 
versation with Miss Ankin and called up Miss 
McCraline, and when she learned I was in the city 
she expressed her delight with many exclamations, 
saying she did not know I would arrive in the city 
until the next day and inquired as to when I would 
call. 

"As nothing is so important as seeing you/' I 
answered. "I will call at two o'clock, if that is 
agreeable to you." 

She assured me that it was and at the appointed 
hour I called at the McCraline home and was 
pleasantly received. Miss McCraline called in her 
mother, whom I thought a very pleasant lady. We 
passed a very agreeable evening together, going 
over on State street to supper and then out to 
Jackson Park. I found Miss McCraline a kind, 
simple, and sympathetic person; in fact, agreeable 
in every way. 

I had grown to feel that if I ever married I would 
simply have to propose to some girl and if accepted, 
marry her and have it over with. I was tired of 
living alone on the claim and wanted a wife and love, 
even if she was a city girl. I felt that I hadn't the 
time to visit all over the country to find a farmer's 
daughter. I had lived in the city and thought if 



198 The Conquest 

I married a city girl I would understand her, any- 
way. I could not claim to be in love with this girl, 
nor with anyone else, but had always had a feeling 
that if a man and woman met and found each other 
pleasant and entertaining, there was no need of a 
long courtship, and when we came in from a walk 
I stated the object of my trip. 

Miss McCraline was acquainted with a part of 
the story for, as stated, she had been teaching in 
M — boro at the time I went there to see Miss Rooks, 
and had seen her take up with the cook and marry 
foolishly. She had stated in her letters that she 
had been glad that I wrote to her and that she 
thought Miss Rooks had acted foolishly, and when 
I explained my circumstances and stated the pro- 
position she seemed favorable to it. I told her to 
think it over and I would return the next day and 
explain it to her mother. 

When I called the next morning and talked with 
her and her mother, they both thought it all right 
that Orlean should go to Dakota and file on the 
homestead, then we would marry and live together 
on the claim, but her mother added somewhat 
nervously and apparently ill at ease, that I had 
better talk with her husband. As the Reverend 
was then some three hundred and seventy-five miles 
south of Chicago attending conference, I couldn't see 
how we could get together, but we put in the Sunday 
attending church and Sunday School, and that even- 
ing went to a downtown theatre where we saw 
Lew Dokstader's ministrels with Neil O'Brien as 
captain of the fire department, which was very 
funny and I laughed until my head ached. 



The Conquest 199 

The next day was spent in trying to communicate 
with the Reverend over the long distance but we 
did not succeed. Fortunately, at about five o'clock 
Mrs. Ewis came over from the west side. I had 
known Mrs. Ewis to be a smart woman with a 
deeper conviction than had Mrs. McCraline, whom 
she did not like, but as Mrs. McCraline was in 
trouble and did not know which way to turn, Mrs. 
Ewis was approached with the subject. Orlean 
was an obedient girl and although she wanted to 
go with me, it was evident that I must get the con- 
sent of her parents. She was nearly twenty-seven 
years old and girls of that age usually wish to get 
married. Her younger sister had just been married, 
which added to her feeling of loneliness. The result 
of the consultation with Mrs. Ewis, as she afterward 
explained to me, was that it was decided that it 
would not be proper for Orlean to go alone with 
me but if I cared to pay her way she would accom- 
pany us as chaperon. I was getting somewhat un- 
easy as I had paid twelve hundred dollars into the 
bank at Megory for the relinquishment, which I 
would lose if someone didn't file on the claim by the 
second of October. It was then about September 
twenty-fifth and I readily consented to incur the 
expense of her trip to Megory, where we soon 
landed. While I had been absent my sister and 
grandmother had arrived. On October first, all three 
were ready to file on their claims, and Dakota's 
colored population would be increased by three, and 
four hundred and eighty acres of land would be 
added to the wealth of the colored race in the state. 
Hundreds of others had purchased relinquishments 



200 TheConquest 

and were waiting to file also. A ruling of the de- 
partment had made it impossible to file before Oc- 
tober first, and when it was seen that only a small 
number would be able to file on that day, the register 
and receiver inaugurated a plan whereby all de- 
siring to file on Tipp county claims should form a 
line in front of the land office door, and when the 
office opened, the line should file through the office 
in the order in which they stood, and numbers would 
be issued to them which would permit them to 
return to the land office and make their filings in 
turn, thereby avoiding a rush and the necessity 
of remaining in line until admitted to the land office # 



The Conquest 



201 




CHAPTER XXXII 

A LONG NIGHT 

j]EOPLE began forming into line immed- 
iately after luncheon, on the afternoon 
of the last day of September and con- 
tinued throughout the afternoon. When 
I saw such a crowd gathering, I got my folks into 
the line. When it is taken into consideration that 
the land office would not open until nine o'clock 
the next morning, this seemed like a foolish proceed- 
ing. It was then four o'clock and the crowd would 
have to remain in line all night to hold their places 
(to be exact, just seventeen hours). Remaining in 
line all night was not pleasantly anticipated, and 
nights in October in South Dakota are apt to get 
pretty chilly, but the line continued to increase 
and by ten o'clock the street in front of the land 
office was a surging mass of humanity, mostly 
purchasers of relinquishments, waiting for the open- 
ing of the l&nd office the next morning and to be in 
readiness to protect the claim they had contracted 
for. Hot coffee and sandwiches were sold and kept 
appetites supplied, and drunks mixed here and there 
in the line kept the crowd wakeful, many singing 
and telling stories to enliven the occasion. I held 
the place for my fiancee through the night, and al- 
though I had become used to all kinds of roughness, 
sitting up in the street all the long night was far 
from pleasant. 

About two o'clock in the morning, squatters, who 
had spent the early part of the night on the prairie 



202 The Conquest 

in order to be on their claims after midnight, began 
to arrive and took their places at the foot of the 
line. All land not filed on by the original number 
holders was to be open for filing as soon as the land 
office opened, and squatters had from midnight until 
the opening of the land office in which to beat the 
man who waited to file, before locating on the land, 
a squatters right holding first in such cases. Many 
had hired autos to bring them in from the reserva- 
tion immediately after midnight, or as soon after 
midnight as they had made some crude improve- 
ments on the land. Many auto loads arrived with 
a shout and claimants leaped from the tonneaus, 
falling into line almost before the vehicles had 
stopped. The line wound back and forth along the 
street like a snake and formed into a compact mass. 
Until after sunrise the noisy autos kept a steady 
rush, dumping their weary passengers into the street. 

By the time the land office opened in the morning, 
the line filled the street for half a block, and fully 
seventeen hundred persons were waiting for a chance 
to enter the land office. An army of tired, swollen- 
eyed and dusty creatures they appeared, some of 
whom commenced dealing their positions in the line 
to late comers, having gotten into line for specula- 
tion purposes only, and offered their places for from 
ten to twenty-five dollars, and in a few instances 
places near the door sold for as high as fifty dollars. 

Under a ruling of the land officials, no filings were 
to be accepted except from holders of original 
numbers until October first, and this ruling made it 
expedient for holders of relinquishments of early 
numbers to get into line early, as the six months 



The Conquest 203 

allowed for establishing residence expired for the 
first hundred original numbers on that day, and in 
cases where residence had not been properly es- 
tablished, the land would be open to contest as soon 
as this period had expired. Many hundreds had 
purchased relinquishments, hence the value placed 
on the positions nearest the land-office door. It 
was three o'clock by the time the line had passed 
through the land office and received their numbers. 
The land office closed at four o'clock for the day, 
which left but one hour for the protection of those 
who must offer their filings that day or face the 
chances of a contest. 

Some had protected their claims by going into 
the land office before the ruling was made and filing 
contests on the claims for which they held relin- 
quishments, but most of the buyers had not thought 
of such a thing, and land grafters had complicated 
matters by filing contests on various claims for which 
they knew relinquishments would be offered and 
then withdrawing the contest, for a consideration. 
This practice met with strong disapproval as most 
of the people had invested for the purpose of mak- 
ing homes, and the laws made it impossible to change 
the circumstances. These transactions had to be 
completed before the line formed, however, as after 
the line formed no one could enter the land office 
to offer either filing, relinquishment or contest, 
without a number issued by the officials. The line 
was full of such grafters, and as not more than one 
hundred filings could be taken in a day, it can readily 
be seen that some of the relinquishment holders 
were in danger of losing out through, a contest 
offered before they had an^opportunity to file. 



204 The Conquest 

The crowds that flock to land openings, like other 
games of chance, are made up in a measure of 
speculators, people who journey to one of the 
registration points and make application for land, 
figuring that if they should draw an early number 
(that is, in the first five hundred) they would file, 
no thought of making a home, but simply to sell 
the relinquishment for the largest possible price. 

When the filings were made, about sixty had 
dropped out of the first five hundred and even more 
out of the second five hundred, evidently thinking 
they were not likely to get enough for the relin- 
quishment to pay them for their trouble and original 
investment, since it cost them a first payment of 
two hundred and six dollars on the purchase price 
of six dollars per acre and a locating fee of twenty- 
five dollars, and in some cases the first expense 
reached three hundred dollars. If the relinquish- 
ment was not sold before the six months allowed 
for establishing residence expired, it was necessary 
to establish residence making sufficient improve- 
ment for that purpose, or lose the money invested. 

Out of the first four thousand numbers some two 
thousand had filed, and practically half of this 
number had contracted to sell their relinquishments. 
The buyers had deposited the amount to be paid in 
some bank to the credit of the claimant, to be turned 
over when the purchaser had secured filing on the 
land, the bank acting as agent between the parties 
to the transaction. 

I shall long remember October 1, 190 — in Me- 
gory — called the "Magic City," and claiming a 
population of three thousand, but probably not 



The Conquest 205 

exceeding one thousand, five hundred actual in- 
habitants, though filled with transients from the 
beginning of the rush a year before, and had at no 
time during this period less than two thousand, five 
hundred persons in the town. 

My bride-to-be and my grandmother had re- 
ceived numbers 138 and 139 which would likely 
be called to file the second day, while my sister 
received 170. On the afternoon of the sec- 
ond, Orlean, and my grandmother, who had 
raised a family in the days of slavery, and was 
then about seventy-seven years of age, were called, 
and came out of the land office a few minutes later 
with their blue papers, receipts for the two hundred 
six dollars, first payment and fees, which I had given 
the agent before they entered the land office. Their 
agent went into the land office with them to see 
that they got a straight filing, which they received. 
My sister, however, was not called that day and the 
next day being Sunday, she would not be called until 
the following Monday. 

The place my grandmother had filed on had been 
bought by a Megory school teacher, who had paid 
one thousand, four hundred dollars to a real estate 
dealer for the relinquishment of the same place. 
The claimant had issued two relinquishments, which 
was easy enough to do, though the relinquishment 
accompanied by his land office receipt was the only 
bona fide one and we had the receipt. The teacher 
had stood in line the long night through, behind 
my sister and then lost the place. The dealer who 
sold her the relinquishment was very angry, as he 
was to get six hundred dollars in the deal, giving 



206 The Conquest 

the claimant only eight hundred. When I learned 
this and that the teacher had lost out I was very 
sorry for her, but it was a case of " first come first 
served/' and many other mix-ups between buyers 
and dealers had occurred. I went to the teacher 
and apologized as best I could. She looked very 
pitiful as she told me how she had taught so many 
years to save the money and her dreams had been 
of nothing but securing a claim. Her eyes filled 
with tears and she bent her head and began crying, 
and thus I left her. 

The next morning I sent Miss McCraline and 
Mrs. Ewis back to Chicago and proceeded to the 
claims of my sister and grandmother, which I found 
to be good ones. I had whirled around them in an 
auto before I bought them, and though being satisfied 
that they laid well I had not examined the soil or 
walked across them. 

In a week I had two frame houses, ten by ten, built 
on them and within another week they had com- 
menced living on them. Shortly after they moved 
onto the claims came one of the biggest snowstorms 
I had ever seen. It snowed for days and then came 
warm weather, thawing the snow, then more snow. 
The corn in the fields had not been gathered nor 
was it all gathered before the following April. 

Most of the settlers in the new county were from 
twenty to fifty miles from Calias and winter caught 
many of them without fuel, and the suffering from 
cold was intense. The snow continued to fall 
until it was about four feet deep on the level. 
Fortunately I had hauled enough coal to last my 
folks through the winter, and they had only to 



The Conquest 207 

get to Ritten, a distance of eight miles, to get food. 
I had just gathered two loads out of a ninety-acre 
field. Being snowbound, with nothing to do, I 
watched the fight between Amro and Victor, with 
interest. 




208 The Conquest 

CHAPTER XXXIII 

THE SURVIVAL OF THE FITTEST 

JlFTER the lot sale Amro still refused 
to move. It was then Ernest Nicholson 
said the town had to be overcome some- 
how and he had to do it. The business 
men of the town continued to hold meetings and pass 
resolutions to stick together. They argued that all 
they had to do to save the town was to stick together. 
This was the slogan of each meeting. Thecountyseat 
no doubt held them more than the meetings, but 
it was not long before signs of weakening began to 
appear here and there along the ranks. 

Victor to the north, in the opinion of the people 
abroad, would get the road; lots were being bought 
up and business people from elsewhere were con- 
tinuing to locate and erect substantial buildings 
in the new town, and then it was reported that Geo. 
Roane, who had recently sold his livery barn in 
Amro where he had made a bunch of money, had 
bought five lots in Victor, paying fancy prices for 
them but getting a refund of fifty per cent if he 
moved or started his residence hotel by January first. 
This report could not be confirmed as Roane could 
not be found, but soon conflicting reports filled the 
air and old Dad Durpee, who loved his corner lot 
in Amro like a hog loves corn, made daily trips up 
and down Main street, railing the boys. The more 
he talked the more excited he became. "My good 
men!" he would shout, with his arms stretched 
above his head like Billy Sunday after preaching 




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The Conquest 209 

awhile. "Stick together! Stick together! We've 
got the best town in the best county, in the best 
state in the best country in the world. What more 
do you want?" He would fairly rave, with his 
old eyes stretched widely open, and his shaggy 
beard flowing in the breeze. He continued this 
until he bored the people and weakened the already 
weakening forces. 

There were many good business men in Amro, 
among them young men of sterling qualities, college- 
bred, ambitious and with dreams of great success 
and of establishing themselves securely. Many of 
them had sweethearts in the east, and desired 
to make a showing and profit as well, and how 
were they to do this in a town in which even out- 
siders, though they might not admire the Nicholsons, 
were predicting failure for those who remained, and 
declaring they were foolish to stay. This young 
blood was getting hard to control, and to hold them 
something more had to be done than declaring 
Ernest Nicholson to be trying to wreck the town 
and break up their homes. Poor fools — I would 
think, as I listened to them, talking as though 
Ernest Nicholson had anything to do with the rail- 
road missing the town. It was simply the mistaken 
location. 

It had been an easy matter for the promoters, 
whose capital was mostly in the air, to locate Amro 
on the allotment of Oliver Amoureaux, because 
they could do so without paying anything, and did 
not have to pay fifty-five dollars an acre for deeded 
land as Nicholson had done. Being centrally 
located and with enough buildings to encourage 
14 



210 TheConquest 

the building of more, they induced the governor 
to organize the county when few but illiterate 
Indians and thieving mixed-bloods could vote, 
fairly stealing the county seat before the bona-fide 
settlers had any chance to express themselves on 
the matter. They had doggedly invested more 
money in cement walks and other improvements, 
when disinterested persons had criticized their 
actions, loading the township with eleven thousand 
dollars, seven per cent interest bearing bonds, that 
sold at a big discount, to build a school house large 
enough for a town three times the size of Amro. 
This angered the settlers and being dissatisfied be- 
cause they were disfranchised by the rascals who en- 
gineered the plan, Amro began rapidly to lose outside 
sympathy. 

Ernest Nicholson had a pleasing personality and 
forceful as well. He was a king at reasoning and 
whenever a weak Amorite was in Calias he was in- 
vited into the townsite company's office which was 
luxuriously furnished, the walls profusely decorated 
with the pictures of prominent capitalists and 
financiers of the middle west, some of whom were 
financing the schemes of the fine looking young 
men who were trying to show these struggling 
waifs of the prairie the inevitable result. 

All that was needed was to break into the town 
in some way or other, for it was essential that Amro 
be absorbed by Victor before the election, ten months 
away. The town should be entirely broken up. 
If it still existed, with or without the road, it had 
a good chance of holding the county seat. A county 
seat is a very hard thing to move. In fact, accord- 



The Conquest 211 

ing to the records of western states, few county seats 
have ever been moved. 

Megory's county seat was located forty miles 
from Megory, in the extreme east end of the county, 
where the county ran to a point and the river on 
the north and the south boundary of the county 
formed an acute angle; yet the county seat remains 
at Fairview and the voters keep it there, where no 
one but a handful of farmers and the few hundred 
inhabitants of the town reside. When trying to 
remove the county seat every town in the county 
jumps into the race, persisting in the contention 
that their town is the proper place for the county 
seat and when election comes, the farmers who 
represent from sixty-five to ninety per cent of the 
vote in states like Dakota, vote for the town nearest 
their farm, thinking only of their own selfish in- 
terests and forgetting the county's welfare, as the 
victor must have a majority of all votes cast. 
Another example of this condition is near where this 
story is written, on the east bank of the Missouri. 
It is a place called Keeler, the most God-forsaken 
place in the world, with only three or four ramshackle 
buildings and a post office, with little or no country 
trade, yet this is a county seat, the capital of one 
of the leading counties of the state; while half a 
dozen good towns along the line of the C. M. & St. 
L. road, cart their records and hold court in Keeler, 
twenty miles from the railroad. Every four years 
for thirty years the county seat has been elected 
to stay at Keeler, as no town can get a majority 
of all votes cast against Keeler, which doesn't even 
enter the race. 



212 The Conquest 

All of these facts had their bearing on Ernest 
Nicholson in his office at Calias, and had helped 
to hold Amro together, until Van Neter was called 
into Calias and into the private office of "King 
Ernest" as Amro had named him. What passed 
in that office at this interview is a matter of con- 
jecture, but when Van Neter came out of the office 
he carried a check for seven thousand, five hundred 
dollars and Ernest Nicholson became the owner 
of the two-story, fifty by one hundred foot hotel and 
lot, Amro's most popular corner. When this news 
reached Amro pandemonium reigned, business men 
passed from one place of business to another talking 
in low tones, and shaking their heads significantly, 
while old Dad Durpee, nearer maniac than ever 
before, went the rounds of the town shouting in 
a high staccato tone: "What do you think of it? 
What do you think of the ornery, low-down rascal's 
selling out. Selling out to that band of dirty 
thieves and town wreckers. By the living gods!" 
With his arms folded like a tragedian, eyes rolled 
to the skies and his form reared back until his knees 
stuck forward, then raising his hand he solemnly 
swore: "I'll stay in Amro! I'll stay in Amro! 
I'll stay in Amro," until his voice rose to a hoarse 
scream. "I'll stay in Amro until the town is de- 
serted to the last d — n building and the last dog 
is dead." And he did, though I cannot say as to 
the last dog. 

Nicholson had the hotel closed and although the 
snow was more than knee-deep on the level, a force 
of carpenters at once began cutting the building in 
two, preparatory to moving it to the new town. 



The Conquest 213 

Old Machalacy Finn, a one-armed, hatchet-faced 
Irishman, with a long sandy mustache and pop- 
eyes, who had moved brick buildings in the windy 
city, was sent to Amro and declared in Joe Cook's 
saloon that he'd put that damned crackerbox in 
Victor in fifteen days, and armed with a force of 
carpenters and laborers, the plaster was soon knocked 
off the walls of the largest and best building in 
Amro and thrown into the streets; while the new 
cement walks, only fifty feet in front and one hun- 
dred by eight at the side, were broken into slabs and 
piled roughly aside, then huge timbers twenty-four 
by thirty-two inches and sixty feet long, from the 
redwood forests of Washington, followed the jack- 
screws and blocks under the building. Two 
sixty-horse power mounted tractors, with double 
boilers and horse power locomotive construction, 
low wheels and high cabs, where the engineer 
perched like a bird, steamed into the town and 
prepared to pull the structure from its foundations. 

The crowd gathered to watch as the powerful 
engines began to cough and roar, with an occasional 
short puff, like fast passenger engines on the New 
York Central, the power being sufficient to tear 
the building to splinters. Creaking in every joint, 
the hotel building began slowly moving out into 
the street. 

The telephone wires, which belonged to the 
Nicholsons, had been cut and thrown aside and the 
town was temporarily without telephonic communi- 
cation. The powerful engines easily pulled the 
hotel between banks of snow, which had been 
shoveled aside to make room for the passing of the 



214 The Conquest 

building across the grades and ditches and on toward 
Victor. A block and tackle was used whenever the 
building became stuck fast and in a few days the 
hotel was serving the public on a corner lot in 
Victor, where it added materially to the appearance 
of the town. 

Following in the footsteps of old Calias, the town, 
now being broken by the removal of the hotel, the 
dark cellar over which it stood gaping like an open 
grave, to be gazed into at every turn, became of 
small consequence, and in Victor the price of corner 
lots had advanced from one thousand, five 
hundred to two thousand and three thousand 
dollars, while inside lots were being offered 
at from one thousand, two hundred to one 
thousand, eight hundred dollars which had formerly 
priced from eight hundred to one thousand, two 
hundred dollars. This did not discourage those 
who wanted to move to the new town. All that 
was desired by former rock-ribbed Amroites was 
to get to Victor. They talked nothing but Victor. 
The name of Amro was almost forgotten. 

Before the hotel building had fairly left the town, 
other traction engines were brought to the town. 
The snow was a great hindrance and to get coal 
hauled from Calias cost seventy-five cents a hundred. 
Labor and board was high, and in fact all prices 
for everything were very high. It was in the middle 
of one of the cold winters of the plains, but money 
had been made in Amro and was offered freely in 
payment for moving to the new town. It was 
bitter cold and the snow was light and drifting, 
the ground frozen under the snow two feet deep, 



The Conquest 215 

but the frozen ground would hold up the buildings 
better than it would when the warm weather came 
and started a thaw. The soil being underlaid with 
sand it would be impossible to move buildings over 
it, if rain should come, as it would be likely to do in 
the spring, and with the melted snow to hinder, it 
would then be very difficult to move the buildings. 
It was small wonder that they were anxious to get 
away from the disrupted town at this time, and the 
road between Amro and Victor became a much 
used thoroughfare. 

The traction engines pounding from early morn- 
ing until late at night filled the air with a noise as 
of railroad yards, while the happy faces of the owners 
of the buildings arriving in Victor, and the anxious 
ones waiting to be moved, gave material for interest- 
ing study of human nature. 

George Roane had built a new barn in Victor and 
was much pleased over having sold the old one in 
Amro before the town went to pieces, thereby saving 
the expense of removal and getting a refund of 
fifty per cent of the purchase price of the lots he 
purchased in Victor. Many buildings continued 
to arrive from Amro, and new ones being erected 
did credit to the name of the new town by growing 
faster than any of the towns on the reservation, 
including Calias or Megory. 




216 The Conquest 

CHAPTER XXXIV 

EAST OF STATE STREET 

HAD in due time heard from Orlean say- 
ing she and Mrs. Ewis had arrived safely 
home. She wrote: "When I came into 
the house mama grabbed me and held 
me for a long time as though she was afraid I was 
not real. She had been so worried while I was 
away and was so glad I had returned before father 
came." They had received a telegram from her 
father saying that he had again been appointed 
presiding elder of the Cairo district and would be 
home within a few days. 

I judged from what Mrs. Ewis had told me that 
the Reverend was not much of a business man and 
a hard one to make understand a business proposi- 
tion or to reason with. He had only two children, 
and Orlean, as Mrs. Ewis informed me, was his 
favorite. She had always been an obedient girl, 
was graduated from the Chicago high school and 
spent two years at a colored boarding school in Ohio 
that was kept up by the African M. E. Church, had 
taught two years, but had not secured a school that 
year. 

She had saved a hundred dollars out of the money 
she had earned teaching school. The young man 
who married her sister worked for a trading-stamp 
corporation and received thirteen dollars a week, 
while the Reverend was supposed to receive about 
a thousand dollars a year as presiding elder. There 
were some twelve or fifteen churches on his circuit, 



The Conquest 217 

where quarterly conference was held every three 
months, and each church was expected to contribute 
a certain amount at that time. Each member was 
supposed to give twenty-five cents, which they did 
not always do. 

In a town like M — boro, for instance, where the 
church had one hundred members, not over twenty- 
five are considered live members; that is, only 
twenty-five could be depended upon to pay their 
quarterly dues regularly, the others being spas- 
modic, contributing freely at times or nothing at 
all for a long time. 

Orlean often laughed as she told me some of the 
many ways her father had of making the "dead 
ones" contribute, but with all the tricks and turns 
the position was not a lucrative one, there being 
no certainty as to the amount of the compensation. 
Mrs. Ewis told me the family had always been poor 
and got along only by saving in every direction. 
I could see this as Orlean seemed to have few clothes 
and had worn her sister's hat to Dakota. 

Her sister was said to be very mean and dis- 
agreeable, and if anyone in the family had to do 
without anything it was never the sister. She was 
quarrelsome and much disliked while Orlean was 
the opposite and would cheerfully deprive herself 
of anything necessary. Her mother, Mrs. Ewis 
went on to tell me, was a "devil, spiteful and mean 
and as helpless as a baby." I believed a part of 
this but not all. I had listened to Mrs. McCraline, 
and while I felt she was somewhat on the helpless 
order, I did not believe she was mean, nor a "devil." 
Meanness and deviltry are usually discernible in 



218 The Conquest 

the eyes and I had seen none of it in the eyes of 
either Mrs. McCraline or Orlean, but I did not like 
Ethel, and from what little Miss Ankin told me about 
the Reverend I was inclined to believe that he was 
likely to be the "devil/' and Mrs. Ewis' information 
regarding Mrs. McCraline was probably inspired 
by jealousy. 

I remembered that back in M — pis the preachers' 
wives were timid creatures, submissive to any order 
or condition their "elder" husbands put upon them, 
submitting too much in order to keep peace, never 
raising a row over the gossip that came to their 
ears from malicious "sisters" and church workers. 
As long as I could remember the colored ministers 
were accused of many ugly things concerning them 
and the "sisters," mostly women who worked in 
the church, but I had forgotten it until I now began 
hearing the gossip concerning Rev. McCraline. 

Orlean, her father and her brother-in-law had 
begun buying a home on Vernon avenue for which 
they were to pay four thousand, five hundred dollars. 
Of this amount three hundred dollars had been paid, 
one hundred by each of them. It was a nice little 
place, with eight rooms and with a stone front. 
Ethel had not paid anything, using her money in 
preparation for her wedding, which had taken place 
in September. Claves and her father had spent 
two hundred on it, which seemed very foolish, and 
were pinched to the last cent when it was done. 

Claves had borrowed five dollars from his brother 
when they went on the wedding trip, to pay for a 
taxi to the depot. The wedding tour and honey- 
moon lasted two weeks and was spent in Racine, 



The Conquest 219 

Wisconsin, sixty miles north of Chicago. They 
had just returned when I went to Chicago. When 
I first called, Mrs. Claves did not come down but 
when we returned to the house she condescended 
to come down and shake hands. She put on enough 
airs to have been a king's daughter. 

With the three hundred dollars already paid on 
the home, they figured they should be able to pay 
for it in seven years in monthly installments of 
thirty-five dollars, paying the interest upon the 
principal at the same time, excepting two thousand 
which was in a first mortgage and drew five per cent 
and payable semi-annually. The house was in a 
quiet neighborhood much unlike the south end of 
Dearborn street and Armour avenue where none 
but colored people live. 

The better class of Chicago's colored population 
was making a strenuous effort to get away from the 
rougher set, as well as to get out of the black belt 
which is centered around Armour, Dearborn, State 
and Thirty-first. Here the saloons, barbershops, 
restaurants and vaudeville shows are run by colored 
people, also the clubs and dance houses. East from 
State street to the lake, which is referred to by the 
colored people of the city as "east of State/' there 
is another and altogether different class. Here for 
a long while colored people could hardly rent or 
buy a place, then as the white population drifted 
farther south, to Greenwood avenue, Hyde Park, 
Kenwood and other parts now fashionable districts, 
some of the avenues including Wabash, Rhodes, 
Calumet, Vernon and Indiana began renting to 
colored people and a few began buying. 



220 The Conquest 

Chicago is the Mecca for southern negroes. The 
better class continued to desert Dearborn and Ar- 
mour and paid exorbitant rent for flats east of State 
street. Some lost what they had made on Armour 
avenue where rent was sometimes less than one-half 
what was charged five blocks east, and had to move 
back to Armour. As more colored people moved 
toward the lake more white people moved farther 
south, rent began falling and real estate dealers 
began offering former homes of rich families first 
for rent then for sale, and many others began buying 
as Rev. McCraline had done, making a small cash 
payment, and in this way otherwise unsalable 
property was disposed of at from five to ten per cent 
more than it would have brought at a cash sale. 

The place they were buying could have been pur- 
chased for three thousand, eight hundred dollars or 
four thousand dollars in cash. After moving east 
of State street, these people formed into little sets 
which represented the more elite, and later de- 
veloped into a sort of local aristocracy, which was 
not distinguished so much by wealth as by the airs 
and conventionality of its members, who did not 
go to public dances on State street and drink "can" 
beer. Here for a time they were secure from the 
vulgar intrusion of the noisy "loud-mouths/' as 
they called them, of State street. The last time I 
was in Chicago State street, the "dead line, "had 
been crossed and a part of Wabash avenue is almost 
as noisy and vulgar as Dearborn. Beer cans, 
rough clubs and dudes were becoming as familiar 
sights as on Armour, and a large part of that part 
of the east side is so filled up with colored people 



The Conquest 221 

that it is only a question of time until it will be a 
part of the black belt. 

Orlean's brother-in-law had come to Chicago 
several years previous from a stumpy farm in the 
backwoods of Tennessee. He was the son of a 
jack-legged preacher and was very ignorant, but 
had been going with the girl he married some six 
years and she had trained him out of much of it 
and when he finally figured in the two hundred 
dollar wedding referred to, he felt himself admitted 
into society and highly exalted. He thought the 
Reverend a great man, Mrs. Ewis had told me, re- 
ferring to him as a Simian-headed negro who tried 
to walk and act like the Reverend. The 
McCralines, especially Ethel, referred to themselves 
as the "best people." I thought they were. They 
were not wicked, and I also guessed that Ethel felt 
very " aristocratic/ * and I wondered whether I 
would like the Reverend. He seemed to be regarded 
as a sort of monarch judging from the way he was 
spoken of by the family, but I had a "hunch" that 
he and I were not going to fall in love with each 
other. Still I hoped not to be the one to start any 
unpleasantness and would at least wait until I met 
him before forming an opinion. I received a letter 
from him when he returned from the conference. 
He did not write a very brilliant letter but was 
very reasonable, and tried to appear a little serious 
when he referred to my having his daughter come 
to South Dakota and file on land. He concluded 
by saying he thought it a good thing for colored 
people to go west and take land. 

I received another letter from Orlean about the 



222 The Conquest 

same time telling me how her father had scolded her 
about going to the theatre with me the Sunday 
night I had taken her, and pretended, as he had to 
me, to be very serious about the claim matter, but 
she wrote like this: "I know papa, and I could see 
he was just pleased over it all that he just strutted 
around like a rooster." She wanted to know when 
I was going to send the ring, but as I had not thought 
about it I do not recall what answer I made her, but 
do remember that my trip to get her and Mrs. Ewis 
and send them home again, including my own 
expenses, amounted to one hundred sixty dollars, 
besides the cost of the land, and having had to pay 
my sister's and grandmother's way also and get 
them started on their homesteads had taken all 
of the seven thousand, six hundred dollars I had 
borrowed on my land; that I was snow-bound with 
my corn in the field and my wheat still unthreshed. 
I began to write long letters trying to reason this 
out with her. She was willing to listen to reason 
but seemed so unhappy without the ring, and I 
imagined as I read her letters that I could see tears. 
She said when a girl is engaged she feels lost without 
a ring, "and, too," here she seemed to emphasize 
her words, "everybody expects it." I was sure 
she was telling the truth, for with girls "east of 
State street," and west as well, the most important 
thing in an engagement is the ring, sometimes being 
more important than the man himself. 

When I lived in Chicago and since I had been 
living in Dakota and going to Chicago once a year, 
I knew that Loftis Brothers had more mortgages 
on the moral future and jobs of the young society 



The Conquest 223 

men, for the diamonds worn by their sweethearts 
or wives, than would appear comforting to the 
credit man. It made no difference what kind of 
a job a man might have, as all the way from a boot- 
black or a janitor to head waiters and post-office 
clerks were included, and their women folks wore 
some size of a diamond. I asked myself what I was 
to do. I could not hope to begin changing customs, 
so I bought a forty dollar diamond set in a small 
eighteen-karat ring which "just fit," as she wrote 
later in the sweetest kind of a letter. 

I had written I was sorry that I could not be 
there to put it on (such a story!). I had never 
thought of diamond rings or going after my wife 
after spending so much on preliminaries. What I 
had pictured was what I had seen, while running 
to the Pacific coast, girls going west to marry their 
pioneer sweethearts, who sent them the money or 
a ticket. They had gone, lots of them, to marry 
their brawny beaux and lived happily "ever after/' 
but the beaux weren't negroes nor the girls colored. 
Still there are lots of colored men who would be 
out west building an empire, and plenty of nice 
colored girls who would journey thither and wed, if 
they really understood the opportunities offered; but 
very few understand the situation or realize the 
opportunities open to them in this western country. 

I had expected to get married Christmas but the 
snow had put a stop to that plan. Besides, I was 
so far behind in my work and had no place to bring 
my wife. I had abandoned my little "soddy" 
and was living in a house on the old townsite, where 
I intended staying until spring. Then I would 



224 The Conquest 

build and move onto my wife's homestead in Tipp 
county. When Christmas came grandma and sister 
came down from Ritten and stayed while I went to 
Chicago. I could scarcely afford it but it had be- 
come a custom for me to spend Christmas in Chicago 
and I wanted to know Orlean better and I wanted 
to meet her father. I had written her that I wasn't 
coming and when I arrived in the city and called 
at the house her mother was surprised, but pleas- 
antly. I thought she was such a kind little soul. 
She promised not to tell Orlean I was in the city, 
(Orlean had secured a position in a downtown store — 
ladies' furnishings — and received five-fifty per week) 
but couldn't keep it and when I was gone she called 
up Orlean and told her I was in the city. When 
I called in the evening, instead of surprising Orlean, 
I was surprised myself. The Reverend hadn't 
arrived from southern Illinois but was expected 
soon. 

Orlean had worked long enough to buy herself 
a new waist and coat, and Mrs. Ewis, who was a 
milliner, had given her a hat, and she was dressed 
somewhat better than formerly. The family had 
wanted to give her a nice wedding, like Ethel's, 
but found themselves unable to do so. The semi- 
annual interest on their two-thousand-dollar loan 
would be due in January and a payment also, about 
one hundred and fifty dollars in all. The high 
cost of living in Chicago did not leave much out of 
eighteen dollars and fifty cents per week, and colored 
people in southern Illinois are not very prompt 
in paying their church dues, especially in mid- 
winter; in fact, many of them have a hard time 




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The Conquest 225 

keeping away from the poorhouse or off the county, 
and when the Reverend came home he was very 
short of money. 

I remember how he appeared the evening I 
called. He had arrived in town that morning. 
He was a large man standing well over six feet and 
weighed about two hundred pounds, small-boned 
and fleshy, which gave him a round, plump appear- 
ance, and although he was then near sixty not a 
wrinkle was visible in his face. He was very dark, 
with a medium forehead and high-bridged nose, 
making it possible for him to wear nose-glasses, the 
nose being very unlike the flat-nosed negro. The 
large square upper-lip was partly hidden by a 
mustache sprinkled with gray, and his nearly white 
hair, worn in a massive pompadour, contrasted 
sharply with the dark skin and rounded features. 
His great height gave him an unusually attractive 
appearance of which he, I later learned, was well 
aware and made the most. In fact, his personal 
appearance was his pride, but his eye was not the 
eye of an intelligent or deep thinking man. They 
reminded me more of the eyes of a pig, full but 
expressionless, and he could put on airs, such a 
drawing-up and spreading-out, seeming to give 
the impression of being hard to approach. 

When introduced to him I had another "hunch" 
we were not going to like each other. I was always 
frank, forward and unafraid, and his ceremonious 
manner did not affect me in the least. I went 
straight to him, taking his hand in response to the 
introduction and saying a few common-place things. 
They were very home-like for city people, inviting 
15 



226 The Conquest 

me to supper and treating me with much respect. 
The head of the table was occupied by the Reverend 
when he was at home and by Claves when the 
Reverend was away. I could readily see where 
Ethel got her airs. It took him about thirty 
minutes to get over his ceremonious manner, after 
which we talked freely, or rather, I talked. He was 
a poor listener and, although he never cut off my 
discourse in any way, he didn't listen as I had been 
used to having people listen, apparently with en- 
couragement in their eyes, which makes talking a 
pleasure, so I soon ceased to talk. This, however, 
seemed still more awkward and I grew to feel a 
trifle displeased in his company. 

On the following Sunday we went to morning 
service on Wabash avenue at a big stone structure. 
It appeared to be a rule of the household that the 
girls should go out together. This displeased me 
very much, as I had grown to dislike Ethel and 
Claves did not interest me. Both talked of society 
and "swell people" they wanted me to meet, putting 
it in such a way as to have me feel I was meeting 
my betters, while the truth of the matter was that 
I did not desire to meet any of their friends nor to 
have them with us anywhere we went. When 
church services were over we went to spend the 
time before Sunday School opened, with some 
friends of theirs named Latimer, who lived on Wabash 
avenue near the church, and who were so nearly 
white that they could easily have passed for white 
people. 

The family consisted of Mr. and Mrs. Latimer 
and Mr. Latimer's sister, and were the most in- 



The Conquest 227 

teresting people I had ever met on any of my trips 
to Chicago. They inquired all about Dakota and 
whether there were many colored settlers in the 
state, listening to every word with careful attention 
and approving or disapproving with nods and 
smiles. While they were so deeply interested, 
Claves, who had a reputation for "butting in" and 
talking too much, interrupted the conversation, 
blurting out his opinion, stopping me and embar- 
rassing them, by stating that colored people had 
been held in slavery for two hundred years and 
since they were free they did not want to go out into 
the wilderness and sit on a farm, but wanted to be 
where they could have freedom and convenience, 
and this was sanctioned by a friend of Claves's 
who was still more ignorant than he. This angered 
Orlean and when we were outside even Ethel ex- 
pressed her disgust at Claves' ignorance. 

They told me that the Latimers were very well- 
to-do, owning considerable property besides the 
three-story building where they lived. To me this 
accounted for their careful attention, for it is my 
opinion that when you find a colored man or woman 
who has succeeded in actually doing something, 
and not merely pretending to, you will find an in- 
teresting and reasonable person to converse with, 
and one who will listen to a description of conditions 
and opportunities with marked intelligence. 

Orlean and I attended a few shows at the down- 
town theatres during the week, the first being a 
pathetic drama which our friends advised us to see 
entitled " Madam X". I did not like it at all. The 
leading character is the wife of a business man who 



228 The Conquest 

has left her husband and remains away from him two 
years, presumably discouraged over his lack of 
affection; is very young and wants to be loved, as 
the "old story" goes, and the husband is too busy 
to know that she is unhappy. She returns after 
two years and asks forgiveness and love, but is 
turned away by the husband. Twenty years later, 
in the closing act, a court scene decorates the stage; 
a woman is on trial for killing the man she has lived 
with unlawfully. She had been a woman of the 
street and lived with many others before living with 
the one murdered. The young lawyer who has 
her case, is her son, although he is not aware of this 
fact. He has just been admitted to the bar and 
this is his first case, having been appointed to the 
defense by the court. He takes the stand and 
delivers an eloquent address on behalf of the woman, 
who appears to be so saturated with liquor and 
cocaine as to be quite oblivious of her surroundings. 
She expires from the effect of her dissipations, but 
just before death she looks up and recognizes her 
son, she having been the young wife who left her 
home twenty-two years before. The unhappy 
father, who had suffered as only a deserted husband 
can and who had prayed for many years for the 
return of the wife, is present in the court room and 
together with the son, are at her side in death. As 
the climax of the play is reached, suppressed sobs 
became audible in the balcony, where we had seats. 
The scene was pathetic, indeed, and I had hard 
work keeping back the tears while my betrothed was 
using her handkerchief freely. 
What I did not like about the play was the fact 



The Conquest 229 

of her going away and taking up an immoral life 
instead of remaining pure and returning later to 
her husband. The husband, as the play goes, had 
not been a bad man and was unhappy throughout 
the play, and I argued this with Orlean all the way 
home. Why did she not remain good and when she 
returned he could have gathered her into his arms 
and " lived happy ever after." Not only my fiancee 
but most other women I have talked with about 
the play contend that he could have taken her back 
when she returned and been good to her. The man 
who wrote the play may have been a tragedian but 
the management that put it on the road knew a 
money-maker and kept it there as long as the people 
patronized the box office. 

The next play we attended suited me better as, 
to my mind, it possessed all that "Madam X" 
lacked and, instead of weakness and an unhappy 
ending, this was one of strength of character and 
a happy finale. It was "The Fourth Estate," by 
Joseph Medill Patterson, who served his appren- 
ticeship in writing on the Chicago Tribune. It 
was a newspaper play and its interest centered 
around one Wheeler Brand, who, through the pur- 
chase of a big city daily by a western man, with the 
bigness to hand out the truth regardless of the 
threats of the big advertisers, becomes managing 
editor. He relentlessly goes after one Judge Bartel- 
ing whose "rotten" decisions had but sufficed to 
help "big business" and without regard to their 
effect upon the poor. The one really square de- 
cision was recalled before it took effect. To com- 
plicate matters the young editor loves the judge's 



230 TheConquest 

daughter and while Brand holds a high place 
in Miss Barteling's regard, he is made to feel 
that to retain it he must stop the fight on her 
father. Brand pleads with her to see the moral 
of it but is unable to change her views. One evening 
Brand secures a flashlight photo and telephone 
witnesses of an interview with the judge, the photo 
showing the judge in the act of handing him a 
ten-thousand-dollar bribe. Late that night Brand 
has the article exposing this transaction in type 
and ready for the press when the proprietor, who 
■ has heretofore been so pleased with Brand's perfor- 
mance, but whose wife has gained an entrance into 
society through the influence of Judge Barteling, 
enters the office with the order to "kill the story." 

This was a hard blow to the coming newspaper 
man. The judge calls and jokes him about being 
a smart boy but crazed with ideals, but is shocked 
when he turns to find his daughter has entered the 
office and has heard the conversation. He tells 
her to come along home with papa, but she decides 
to remain with Brand. She has thought her father 
in the right all along, but now that she has heard her 
father condone dishonesty she can no longer think 
so. Wheeler disobeys orders and sends the paper 
to press without "killing the story," and "all's well 
that ends well." 

In a week or so I was back in Dakota where the 
thermometer registered twenty-five below with 
plenty of snow for company. I received a letter 
from the Reverend shortly after returning home 
saying they hoped to see me in Chicago again soon. 
I did not know what that meant unless it was that 



The Conquest 231 

I was expected to return to be married, but as I 
had been to Chicago twice in less than four months 
and had suggested to Orlean that she come to 
Megory and be married there, I supposed that it 
was all settled, but this was where I began to learn 
that the McCraline family were very inconsiderate. 

I had not claimed to be wealthy or to have un- 
limited amounts of money to spend in going to and 
from Chicago, as though it were a matter of eighty 
miles instead of eight hundred. I had explained 
to the Reverend that it was a burden rather than 
a luxury to be possessed of a lot of raw land, until 
it could be cultivated and made to yield a profit. 
I recalled that while talking with the Reverend in 
regard to this he had nodded his head in assent but 
with no facial expression to indicate that he under- 
stood or cared. The more I knew him the more 
I disliked him, and was very sorry that Orlean re- 
garded his as a great man, although his immediate 
family were the only ones who regarded him in 
that light. I had learned to expect his ceremonious 
manner but was considerably tried by his apparent 
dullness and lack of interest or encouragement of 
practical ideas. 

I put volumes into my letters to Orlean, trying to 
make clear why she should condescend to come to 
Megory and be quietly married instead of obliging 
me to return to Chicago. I had no more money, 
as it was expensive to keep my grandmother and 
sister on their claims. They had no money and I 
had no outside support, not even the moral support 
of my people nor of Orlean's, who all seemed to 
take it for granted that I had plenty of ready money. 



232 The Conquest 

I had not taken a cent out of the crop I had raised, 
the corn still standing in the field, with a heavy snow 
on the ground and my small grain still unthreshed. 
However, my letters were in vain. Miss Mc- 
Craline could see no other way than that if I cared 
for her I'd come and marry her at home, which she 
contended was no more than right and would look 
much better. I sighed wearily over it all and began 
to suspect I was "in the right church, but in the 
wrong pew." 




The Conquest 233 

CHAPTER XXXV 

AN UNCROWNED KING 

|OWARD spring the snow melted and 
with gum boots I plunged into the cold, 
wet corn field and began gathering the 
corn. It was nasty, cold work. The 
damp earth sent cold chills up through my limbs 
and as a result I was ill, and could do nothing for 
a week or more. In desperation I wrote the Rever- 
end and being a man, I hoped he'd understand. I 
told him of my sickness and the circumstances, of 
(Mean's claim and of my crops to be put in. It was 
then April and soon the oats, wheat and barley 
should be seeded. It was a business letter al- 
together, but I never heard from him, and later 
learned that he had read only a part of the letter. 
While in Chicago, one evening I had called at 
the house and found the household in a ferment of 
excitement, with everyone saying nothing and 
apparently trying to look as small and scarced as 
possible, while in their midst, standing like a jungle 
king and in a plaided bathrobe, the Reverend was 
pouring a storm of abuse upon his wife and shouting 
orders while the wife was trotting to and fro like 
a frightened lamb, protesting weakly. The way he 
was storming at her made me feel ashamed but after 
listening to his tirade for some fifteen minutes I 
was angry enough to knock him down then and there. 
He reminded me more of a brute than a pious min- 
ister. When he had finally exhausted himself he 
turned without speaking to me and strode up the 



234 The Conquest 

stairs, head reared back and carrying himself like 
a brave soldier returning from war. I wondered 
then how long it would be before I would be com- 
manded as she had been. Shortly afterward I 
could hardly control the impulse to take her in my 
arms and comfort her. She was crying quietly 
and looked so pitiful. I was told she had been 
treated in a like manner off and on for thirty years. 

As stated, I did not hear from the Reverend and 
when I wrote to Orlean I implied that I did not 
think her father much of a business man. Perhaps 
this was wrong, at least when I received another 
letter from her it contained the receipt for the pay- 
ment on the claim, and the single sheet of paper 
comprising the letter conveyed the intelligence 
that since she thought it best not to marry me she 
was forwarding the receipt with thanks for my kind- 
ness and hopes for future success. I received the 
letter on Friday. Saturday night I went into 
Megory and took the early Sunday morning train 
bound for Chicago and to marry her, and while I 
did not think she had treated me just right I would 
not allow a matter of a trip to Chicago to stand in 
the way of our marriage. I had an idea her father 
was indirectly responsible. He and I were much 
unlike and disagreed in our discussions concerning 
the so-called negro problem, and in almost every 
other discussion in which we had engaged. 

Arriving in Omaha I sent a telegram to Orlean 
asking her not to go to work that day, as I would 
be in Chicago in the morning. At the depot I 
called up the house and Claves answered the phone 
and was very impertinent, but before he said much 



The Conquest 235 

Orlean took the receiver and without much welcome 
started to tell me about the criticisms of her father 
in my letters. 

"You are not taking it in the right way," I 
hurriedly told her. "I'll come to the house and 
we'll talk it over. You will see me, won't you? " 

"Yes," she answered hesitatingly, appearing to 
be a little frightened. Then added, "Til do you 
that honor." 

The Reverend had returned to Southern Illinois, 
and when I entered the house the rest of the family 
appeared to have been holding a consultation in 
the kitchen, which they had, as Orlean informed 
me later, with Orlean standing poutingly to one 
side. She commenced telling me what she was not 
going to do, but I went directly to her, and gathered 
her in my arms, with her making a slight resistance 
but soon succumbing. I looked down at her still 
pouting face and remonstrated teasingly.. 

Ethel broke in, her voice resembling a scream, 
protesting against such boldness on my part, say- 
ing: "Orlean doesn't want you and she isn't going 
to go onto your old farm". Here Orlean silenced 
her saying that she would attend to that herself, 
and took me to the front part of the house, with her 
mother tagging after us in a sort of half -stupor and 
apparently not knowing what to do. We sat down 
on the davenport where she began giving me a 
lecture and declaring what she was not going to do. 
Her mother interposed something that angered me, 
though I do not now recall what it was, and a look 
of dissatisfaction came into my face which Orlean 
observed. 



236 The Conquest 

" Don't you scold mama/' she finished. "Now, 
do you hear?" 

"Yes, dear," I answered, meekly, with my arm 
around her waist and my face hidden behind her 
shoulder. "Anything more?" 

"Well, well." She appeared at a loss to know 
what further to say or how to proceed. 

Ethel remarked afterward to her mother that 
Orlean had not been near me a half hour until she 
was listening to everything I said. 

She finally succeeded in getting off to work 
after commanding me to free her as she wanted 
to get away to think, Her mother bristled up 
with an, "I'll talk to you." This was entirely to 
my liking. I loved her mother as well as my own 
and had no fear that we would not soon agree, and 
we did. She couldn't be serious with me very long. 
She persisted in saying, however: 

"I want my husband to know you are here and 
to know all about this. You must not expect to 
run in and get his daughter just like something wild, 
nor you just must not!" 

"All right, mother," I assented. "But I must 
hurry back to Dakota, you know, for I can't lose 
so much time this time of year." 

"You're the worst man I ever saw for always 
being in a hurry. I — I'll— well, I do declare!' 
And she bustled off to the kitchen with me following 
and talking. 

"Oh, can't I get away from you? This is just 
awful, Mr. Devereaux." 

"Don't you like the name?" I put in winningly 
and cutting off her discourse, and in spite of her at- 
tempt at seriousness she smiled. 



The Conquest 237 

"It is a beautiful name," she admitted, looking 
at me slyly out of her small black eyes. She was 
part Indian, just a trifle, but sufficient to give her 
black eyes instead of brown, as most colored 
people have, and she had long black hair. 

Before Orlean returned from the store her mother 
and I were like mother and son and Orlean seemed 
pleased, while Ethel looked at Claves and admitted 
that I would get Orlean, anyhow. The only thing 
necessary now was to reach the elder, and the next 
morning we spent a couple of hours trying to locate 
him by telephone. We finally succeeded, as I 
thought, but he denied later he was the party, 
though I would have sworn to the voice being his as 
I could hear him distinctly. In answer to my 
statement that we were ready to marry he shouted 
in a frantic voice: 

"I don't approve of it! I don't approve of it! 
I don't approve of it!" and kept shouting it over 
and over until the operator called the time was up. 

A letter had been sent him by special delivery the 
day I arrived and the following morning a reply 
was received stating that if Orlean married me, 
without my convincing him that I was marrying 
her for love, and not to hold down a Dakota claim, 
she would be doing so without his consent. In 
discussing the matter later Ethel, who had become 
resigned to the inevitable, said : 

"If you want to get along with papa you must 
flatter him. Just make him think he is a king." 

"Ah," I thought. "Here is where I made my 
mistake." 

I had started wrong. "Just make him think he 



238 TheConquest 

is a king, His Majesty Newton Jasper." The 
idea kept revolving in my mind as I realized the 
reason I had not made good with him. I was too 
plain and sincere. I must flatter him, make him 
think he was what he was not, and my failure to do 
that was the reason for his listening to me in such 
an expressionless manner. 

Somewhere I had read that to be a king was to 
look wise and say nothing. This is what he had 
done. Evidently he liked to feel great. I recalled 
the name he was known by, "the Reverend N. J.," 
and I had heard him spoken of jokingly as the " Great 
N. J." The N. J. was for Newton Jasper. Ha! 
Ha! The more I thought of his greatness the more 
amused I became. I might have settled the matter 
easily if I had no objection to flattering him. He 
arrived home the next morning and was sitting in 
the parlor when I called, trying to look serious, and 
surveying me as I entered, just as a king might have 
done a disobedient subject. I had been so free 
and without fear for so long that it was beyond my 
ability to shrivel up and drop as he continued to 
look me over. I proceeded to tell him all that I had 
written in my letter to him, the one he had not 
read, but did not intimate that I knew he had not 
read it. 

In the dining room where we gathered a few 
minutes later, with the family assembled in mute 
attention, he asked Orlean whether she wanted 
to marry me and live in Dakota and she admitted 
that she did. Then turning to me he began a 
lengthy discourse with many ifs and if nots and kept 
it up until I cut in with: 



The Conquest 239 

"My dear people, when I first came to see Orlean 
I didn't profess love. Circumstances had not 
granted us the opportunity, but we entered a mutual 
agreement that we would wait and see whether we 
could learn to love each other or not." Hesitating 
a moment, I looked at Orlean and gaining confidence 
as I met her soft glance, I went on: "I cannot 
guarantee anything as to the future. We may be 
happy, and we may not, but I hope for the best." 

That seemed to satisfy him and he was very nice 
about it afterward. Orlean and I had been to the 
court house the day previous and got the license, 
and when her father told us we should go and get 
the license we looked at each other rather sheepishly, 
and stammered out something, but went down town 
and bought a pair of shoes instead. When we ar- 
rived home preparations were being made for the 
wedding. The elder called up the homes of two 
bishops who lived in the city, and when he found one 
sick and the other out of town he was somewhat 
disappointed, as it had always been, his desire to 
have his daughters married by a bishop. He had 
failed in the first instance and was compelled to 
accept the services of the pastor of one of the three 
large African M. E. Churches of the city at the 
wedding of Ethel, and had to call upon this pastor 
again but found he also was out of the city. He 
finally secured the services of another pastor, by 
whom we were married in the presence of some 
twenty or more near friends of the family, Orlean 
wearing her sister's wedding dress and veil. The 
dress was becoming and I thought her very beautiful. 
I wore a Prince Albert coat and trousers to match 



240 The Conquest 

which belonged to Claves and were too small and 
tight, making me uncomfortable. I was not long 
in getting out of them after undergoing the ordeal 
of being kissed by all the ladies present. Mrs. Ewis 
invited us to spend the evening at her home and 
the next day we left for South Dakota. 



mmmim^Mmz:. 




00 






3 




The Conquest 241 

CHAPTER XXXVI 

A SNAKE IN THE GRASS 

USUALLY in the story of a man's life, or 
in fiction, when he gets the girl's consent 
to marry, first admitting the love, the 
story ends; but with mine it was much 
to the contrary. The story did not end there, 
nor when we had married that afternoon at two 
o'clock. Instead, my marriage brought the change 
in my life which was the indirect cause of my writing 
this story. From that time adventures were numer- 
ous. We arrived in Megory several hours late and 
remained over night at a hotel, going to the farm the 
next morning and then to the house I had rented 
temporarily. 

I breathed a sigh of relief when I looked over the 
fields, and saw that the boy I hired had done nicely 
with the work during my absence. The next night 
about sixty of the white neighbors gave us a chari- 
vari and my wife was much pleased to know there 
was no color prejudice among them. We purchased 
about a hundred dollars worth of furniture in the 
town and at once began housekeeping. My bride 
didn't know much about cooking, but otherwise 
was a good housekeeper, and willing to learn all 
she could. She was not a forceful person and could 
not be hurried, but was kind and good as could be, 
and I soon became very fond of her and found mar- 
riage much of an improvement over living alone. 
In May we went up to her claim and put up a sod 
house and stayed there awhile, later returning to 
16 



242 The Conquest 

Megory county to look after the crops. Our first 
trouble occurred in about a month. I was still 
rather angry over the Reverend's obliging me to 
spend the money to go to Chicago. This had cost 
me a hundred dollars which I needed badly to pay 
the interest on my loan. Letters began coming 
from the company holding the mortgages, besides 
I had other obligations pending. I had only fifty 
dollars in the bank when I started to Chicago and 
while there drew checks on it for fifty more, making 
an overdraft of fifty dollars which it took me a month 
to get paid after returning home. The furniture 
required for housekeeping and improvements in 
connection with the homesteads took more money, 
and my sister went home to attend the graduation 
of another sister and I was required to pay the bills. 
My corn was gathered and I now shelled it. As the 
price in Megory was only forty cents at the elevators 
I hauled it to Victor, where I received seventy and 
sometimes seventy-five cents for it, but as it was 
thirty -five miles, that took time and the long drive 
was hard on the horses. (Mean's folks kept writing 
letters telling her she must send money to buy some- 
thing they thought nice for her to have, and while 
no doubt not intending to cause any trouble, they 
made it very hard for me. Money matters are 
usually a source of trouble to the lives of newly-weds 
and business is so cold-blooded that it contrasts 
severely with love's young dream. 

My position was a trying one for the reason that 
all the relatives on both sides seemed to take it for 
granted that I should have plenty of money, and 
nothing I could say or do seemed to change matters 



The Conquest 243 

From his circuit the Reverend wrote glowing letters 
to his "daughter and son/' of what all the people 
.were saying. Everybody thought she had married 
so well; Mr. Deveraux, or Oscar, as they put it, 
was of good family, a successful young man, and 
was rich. I hadn't written to him and called him 
"dear father." Perhaps this is what I should have 
done. In a way it would have been easy enough 
to write, and since my marriage I had no letters to 
spend hours in writing. Perhaps I should have 
written to him, but when a man is in the position 
I faced, debts on one side and relatives on the other, 
I thought it would not do to write as I felt, and I 
could not write otherwise and play the hypocrite, as 
I had not liked him from the beginning, and now dis- 
liked him still more because I could find no way of 
letting him know how I felt. This was no doubt 
foolish, but it was the way I felt about it at the time. 
My father-in-law evidently thought me ungrateful, 
and wrote Orlean that I should write him or the 
folks at home occasionally, but I remained obdurate. 
I felt sure he expected me to feel flattered over the 
opinions of which he had written in regard to my 
being considered rich, but I did not want to be 
considered rich, for I was not. I had never been 
vain, and hating flattery, I wanted to tell her people 
the truth. I wanted them to understand, if they 
did not, what it took to make good in this western 
country, and that I had a load and wanted their 
encouragement and invited criticism, not empty 
praise and flattery. 

Before I had any colored people to discourage me 
with their ignorance of business or what is required 



244 T|h e C o rTq u e s t 

for success, I was stimulated to effort by the example 
of my white neighbors and friends who were doing 
what I admired, building an empire; and to me that 
was the big idea. Their parents before them knew 
something of business and this knowledge was a 
goodly heritage. If they could not help their 
children with money they at least gave their moral 
support and visited them and encouraged them 
with kind words of hope and cheer. The people 
in a new country live mostly on hopes for the first 
five or ten years. My parents and grandparents 
had been slaves, honest, but ignorant. My father 
could neither read nor write, had not succeeded in a 
large way, and had nothing to give me as a start, 
not even practical knowledge. My wife's parents 
were a little different, but it would have been better 
for me had her father been other than "the big 
preacher" as he was referred to, who in order to 
be at peace with, it was necessary to praise. 

What I wanted in the circumstances I now faced 
was to be allowed to mould my wife into a practical 
woman who would be a help in the work we had 
before us, and some day, I assured her, we would 
be well to do, and then we could have the better 
things of life. 

"How long?" She would ask, weeping. She 
was always crying and so many tears got on my 
nerves, especially when my creditors were pestering 
me with duns, and it is Hades to be dunned, es- 
pecially when you have not been used to it. 

"Oh!" Fd say. "Five or ten years." 

And then she'd have another cry, and I would 
have to do a lot of petting and persuading to keep 



The Conquest 245 

her from telling her mother. This all had a ten- 
dency to make me cross and I began to neglect 
kissing her as much as I had been doing, but she 
was good and had been a nice girl when I married 
her. She could only be made to stop crying when 
I would spend an hour or two petting and assuring 
her I still loved her, and this when I should have been 
in the fields. She would ask me a dozen times a 
day whether I still loved her, or was I growing tired 
of her so soon. She was a veritable clinging vine. 
This continued until we were both decidedly un- 
happy and then began ugly little quarrels, but when 
she would be away with my sister to her claim in 
Tipp county I would be so lonesome without her, 
simple as I thought she was, and days seemed like 
weeks. 

One day she was late in bringing my dinner to 
the field where I was plowing, and we had a quarrel 
which made us both so miserable and unhappy that 
we were ashamed of ourselves. By some power for 
which we were neither responsible, our disagree- 
ments came to an end and we never quarreled again. 

The first two weeks in June were hot and dry, 
and considerable damage was done to the crops in 
Tipp county and in Megory county also. The 
winds blew from the south and became so hot the 
young green plants began to fire, but a big rain on 
the twenty-fouith saved the crops in Megory 
county. About that time the Reverend wrote that 
he would come to see us after conference, which 
was then three months away. 

One day we were going to town after our little 
quarrels were over, and I talked kindly with Orlean 



246 The Conquest 

about her father and tried to overcome my dislike 
of him, for her sake. I had learned by that time 
just how she had been raised, and that was to 
to praise her father. She would say: 

"You know, papa is such a big man," or "He 
is so great." 

She had begun to call me her great and big hus- 
band, and I think that had been the cause of part of 
our quarrels for I had discouraged it. I had a 
horror of praise when I thought how silly her father 
was over it, and she had about ceased and now 
talked more sensibly, weighing matters and help- 
ing me a little mentally. 

We talked of her father and his expected visit. 
She appeared so pleased over the prospect and said : 

"Won't he make a hit up here? Won't these 
white people be foolish over his fine looks and that 
beautiful white hair?" And she raised her hands 
and drew them back as I had seen her do in stroking 
her father's hair. 

I agreed with her that he would attract some 
attention and changed the subject. When we 
returned home she gave me the letter to read that 
she had written to him. She was obedient and did 
try so hard to please me, and when I read in the 
letter she had written that we had been to town and 
had talked about him all the way and were anxious 
for him to visit us; that we had agreed that he would 
make a great impression with the people out here, 
I wanted very much to tell her not to send that 
letter as it placed me in a false light, and would 
cause him to think the people were going to be 
crazy about him and his distinguished appearance; 



The Conquest 247 

but she was watching me so closely that I could 
not be mean enough to speak my mind and did not 
offer my usual criticism. 

A short time before her father arrived, a contest 
was filed against (Mean's claim on the ground that 
she had never established a residence. We had 
established residence, but by staying much of the 
time in Megory county had laid the claim liable 
to contest. The man who filed the contest was a 
banker in Amro, this bank being one of the few 
buildings left there. I knew we were in for a 
big expense and lots of trouble, which I had feared, 
and had been working early and late to get through 
my work in Megory county and get onto her claim 
permanently. 

We did not receive the Reverend's letter stating 
when he would arrive so I was not at the train to 
meet him, but happened to be in town on horse 
back. In answer to my inquiries, a man who had 
come in on the train gave me a description of a 
colored man who had arrived on the same train, 
and I knew that my father-in-law was in town. 
I went to the hotel and found he had left his baggage 
but had gone to the restaurant, where I found him. 
He seemed pleased to be in Megory and after I 
explained that I had not received his letter, I went 
to look up a German neighbor who was in town in 
a buggy, thinking I would have the Reverend ride 
out with him. When we got ready to go the German 
was so drunk and noisy that the Reverend was 
frightened and remarked cautiously that he did 
not know whether he wanted to ride out with a 
drunken man or not. The German heard him and 
roared in a still louder tone: 



248 TheConquest 

''You don't have to ride with me. Naw! Naw! 
Naw!" 

The elder became more frightened at this and 
hurriedly ducked into the hotel, where he stayed. 
I hitched a team of young mules to the wagon the 
next morning and sent Orlean to town after him. 

The Reverend seemed to be carried away with 
our lives on the Little Crow, and we got along fine 
until he and I got to arguing the race question, 
which brought about friction. It was as I had 
feared but it seemed impossible to avoid it. He had 
the most ancient and backward ideas concerning 
race advancement I had ever heard. He was filled 
to overflowing with condemnation of the white 
race and eulogy of the negro. In his idea the negro 
had no fault, nor could he do any wrong or make 
any mistake. Everything had been against him 
and according to the Reverend's idea, was still. 
This he would declare very loudly. From the race 
question we drifted to the discussion of mixed 
schools. 

The Reverend had educated his girls with the 
intention of making teachers of them and would 
speak of this fact with much pride, speaking slowly 
and distinctly like one who has had years of oratory. 
He would insist that the public schools of Chicago 
have not given them a chance. "I am opposed 
to mixed schools," he would exclaim. "They are 
like everything else the white people control. They 
are managed in a way to keep the colored people 
down." 

Here Orlean dissented, this being about the only 
time she did openly disagree with him. She was 



The Conquest 249 

firm in declaring there was no law or management 
preventing the colored girls' teaching in Chicago 
if they were competent. 

"In the first place/' she carefully continued, 
"the school we attended in Ohio does not admit 
to teach in the city." 

In order to teach in the city schools it is either 
necessary to be a graduate of the normal, or have had 
a certain number of years' experience elsewhere. 
I do not remember all the whys, but she was em- 
phatic and continued to insist that it was to some 
extent the fault of the girls, who were not all as 
attentive to books as they should be; spending too 
much time in society or with something else that 
kept them from their studies, which impaired their 
chances when they attempted to enter the city 
schools. 

She held up instances where colored girls were 
teaching in Chicago schools and had been for years, 
which knocked the foundation from his argument. 

There are very few colored people in a city or 
state which has mixed schools, who desire to have 
them separated. The mixed schools give the col- 
ored children a more equal opportunity and all the 
advantage of efficient management. Separate 
schools lack this. Even in the large cities, where 
separate schools are in force, the advantage is in- 
variably with the white schools. 

Another advantage of mixed schools is, it helps 
to eliminate so much prejudice. Many ignorant 
colored people, as well as many ignorant white 
people, fill their children's minds with undue prej- 
udice against each race. If they are kept in sepa- 



250 The Conquest 

rate schools this line becomes more distinct, with 
one colored child filling the mind of other colored 
children with bad ideas, and the white child doing 
likewise, which is never helpful to the community. 
By nature, in the past at least, the colored children 
were more ferocious and aggressive; too much so, 
which is because they have not been out of heathen- 
ism many years. The mixed school helps to elim- 
inate this tendency. 

With the Reverend it was a self-evident fact, that 
the only thing he cared about was that it would 
be easier for the colored girls to teach, if the schools 
were separate. I was becoming more and more 
convinced that he belonged to the class of the negro 
race that desires ease, privilege, freedom, position, 
and luxury without any great material effort on 
their part to acquire it, and still held to the time- 
worn cry of "no opportunity. " 

Following this disagreement came another. I 
had always approved of Booker T. Washington, 
his life and his work in the uplift of the negro. 
Before his name was mentioned I had decided just 
about how he would take it, and I was not mis- 
taken. He was bitterly opposed to the educator. 




The Conquest 251 

CHAPTER XXXVII 

THE PROGRESSIVES AND THE REACTIONARIES 

]|T is not commonly known by the white 
people at large that a great number of 
colored people are against Mr. Washing- 
ton. Being an educator and philan- 
thropist, it is hard to conceive any reason why they 
should be opposed to him, but the fact remains 
that they are. 

There are two distinct factions of the negro race, 
who might be classed as Progressives and Re- 
actionaries, somewhat like the politicians. The 
Progressives, led by Booker T. Washington and 
with industrial education as the material idea, are 
good, active citizens; while the other class distinctly 
reactionary in every way, contend for more equal 
rights, privileges, and protection, which is all very 
logical, indeed, but they do not substantiate their 
demands with any concrete policies; depending 
largely on loud demands, and are too much given 
to the condemnation of the entire white race for 
the depredations of a few. 

It is true, very true indeed, that the American 
negro does not receive all he is entitled to under 
the constitution. Volumes could be filled with the 
many injustices he has to suffer, and which are not 
right before God and man; yet, when it is considered 
that other races in other countries, are persecuted 
even more than the negro is in parts of the United 
States, there should be no reason why the American 
negro allow obvious prejudice to prevent his taking 
advantage of opportunities that surround him. 



252 The Conquest 

I have been called a "radical," perhaps I am, but 
for years I have felt constrained to deplore the neg- 
ligence of the colored race in America, in not seizing 
the opportunity for monopolizing more of the many 
million acres of rich farm lands in the great north- 
west, where immigrants from the old world own 
many of acres of rich farm lands; while the millions 
of blacks, only a few hundred miles away, are as 
oblivious to it all as the heathen of Africa are to 
civilization. 

In Iowa, for instance, where the number of farms 
total around two hundred and ten thousand, and 
include the richest land in the world, only thirty- 
seven are owned and operated by negroes, while 
South Dakota, Wisconsin, Minnesota, and North 
Dakota have many less. I would quote these facts 
to my father-in-law until I was darker in the face 
than I naturally am. He could offer no counter 
argument to them, but continued to vituperate the 
sins of the white people. He was a member in 
good standing of the reactionary faction of the 
negro race, the larger part of which are African M. E. 
ministers. 

Since Booker T. Washington came into promi- 
nence they have held back and done what they could 
to impede and criticize his work, and cast little 
stones in his path of progress, while most of the 
younger members of the ministry are heart and 
soul in accord with him and are helping all they can. 
The older members are almost to a unit, with some 
exceptions, of course, against him and his industrial 
educational ideas. 

A few years ago a professor in a colored university 



The Conquest 253 

in Georgia wrote a book which had a tremendous 
sale. He claimed in his book that the public had 
become so over-enthused regarding Booker T. 
and industrial education, that the colored schools 
for literary training were almost forgotten, and, 
of course, were severely handicapped by a lack of 
funds. His was not criticism, but was intended to 
call attention of the public to the number of colored 
schools in dire need of funds, which on account of 
race prejudice in the south, must teach classics. 
This was true, although industrial education was 
the first means of lifting the ignorant masses into 
a state of good citizenship. Immediately following 
the publication of the volume referred to, thousands 
of anti-Booker TVs proceeded to place the writer 
as representing their cause and formed all kinds of 
clubs in his honor, or gave their clubs his name. 
They pretended to feel and to have everyone else 
feel, that they had at last found a man who would 
lead them against Booker T. and industrial educa- 
tion. 

They made a lot of noise for a while, which soon 
died out, however, as the author of the book was 
far too broad minded and intelligent in every way, 
to be a party to such a theory, much less, to lead 
a lot of reckless people, who never had and never 
would do anything for the uplifting of their race. 

The Reverend and I could not in any way agree. 
He was so bitter against industrial education and the 
educator's name, that he lost all composure in 
trying to dodge the issue in our argument, and found 
himself up against a brick wall in attempting to 
belittle Mr. Washington's work. Most of the 



254 The Conquest 

trouble with the elder was, that he was not an in- 
telligent man, never read anything but negro papers, 
and was interested only in negro questions. He was 
born in Arkansas, but maintained false ideas about 
himself. He never admitted to having been born 
a slave, but he was nearly sixty years of age, and 
sixty years ago a negro born in Arkansas would have 
been born in slavery, unless his parents had pur- 
chased themselves. If this had been the case, as 
vain as he was, I felt sure he would have had much 
to say about it. He must have been born a slave, 
but of course had been young when freed. He had 
lived in Springfield, Missouri, after leaving Ar- 
kansas, and later moving to Iowa, where, at the 
age of twenty-seven years, he was ordained a min- 
ister and started to preach, which he had continued 
for thirty years or more. He never had any theo- 
logical training. This was told me by my wife, and 
she added despairingly: 

"Poor papa! He is just ignorant and hard- 
headed, and all his life has been associated with 
hard-headed negro preachers. He reads nothing 
but radical negro papers and wants everybody to 
regard him as being a brilliant man, and you might 
as well try to reason with two trees, or a brick wall, 
as to try to reason with him or Ethel. I'm so sorry 
papa is so ignorant. Mama has always tried to 
get him to study, but he would never do it. That's 
all/' 

We went up to the claims, taking the elder along. 
My sister had married and her husband was making 
hay on the claims. 

I might have been more patient with the Rever- 



The Conquest 255 

end, if he had not been so full of pretense, when 
being plain and truthful would have been so much 
better and easier. I had quit talking to him about 
anything serious or anything that interested me, 
but would sit and listen to him talk of the big 
preachers, and the bishops, and the great negroes 
who had died years before. He seemed fond of 
talking of what they had done in the past and what 
more could be done in the future, if the white people 
were not so strongly banded against them. After 
this, his conversation would turn to pure gossip, 
such as women might indulge in. He talked about 
the women belonging to the churches of his district, 
whether they were living right or wrong, and could 
tell very funny stories about them. 

In Dakota, like most parts of the west, people 
who have any money at all, carry no cash in the 
pocket, but bank their money and use checks. 
The people of the east and south, that is, the com- 
mon people, seldom have a checking account, and, 
with the masses of the negroes, no account at all. 
During the summer Orlean had sent her father my 
checks with which to make purchases. The Rever- 
end told me he checked altogether, but my wife 
had told me her father's ambition had always been 
to have a checking account, but had not been able 
to do so. I had to laugh over this, for it was no 
distinction whatever. We discussed the banking 
business and the elder tried to tell me that if a 
national bank went broke, the government paid all 
the depositors, while if it was a state bank, the 
depositors lost. As this was so far from correct, I 
explained the laws that governed national banks 



256 Tue Conquest 

and state banks alike, as regards the depositors, in 
the event of insolvency. I did not mean to bring 
out such a storm but he flew into an accusation, 
exclaiming excitedly: 

"That's just the way you are! You must have 
everything your way! I never saw such a contrary 
man! You won't believe anything !" 

"But, Reverend," I remonstrated. "I have no 
'way' in this. What I have quoted you is simply 
the law, the law governing national and state bank 
deposits, that you can read up on yourself, just the 
same as I have done. If I am wrong, I very humbly 
beg your pardon." 

The poor old man was so qhagrined he seemed 
hardly to know what to do, though this was but one 
of many awkward situations due to his ignorance 
of the most simple business matters. Another time 
he was trying to listen intelligently to a conversation 
relating to the development of the northwest, when 
I had occasion to speak of Jim Hill. Seeing he 
did not look enlightened, I repeated, this time 
referring to him as James J. Hill, of the Great 
Northern, and inquired if he had not heard of the 
pioneer builder. 

"No, I never heard of him," he answered. 

"Never heard of James J. Hill?" I exclaimed, 
in surprise. 

"Why should I have heard of him," he said, 
answering my exclamation calmly. 

"0, no reason at all," I concluded, and remained 
silent, but my face must have expressed my disgust 
at his ignorance, and he a public man for thirty 
years. 




$ 



1 

J 

o 

O 

1 

H 



The Conquest 257 

After this conversation I forced myself to remain 
quiet and listen to common gossip. Instead of 
being pleased to see us happy and Orlean contented, 
he would, whenever alone with her, discourage her 
in every way he could, sighing for sympathy, prais- 
ing Claves and telling her how much he was doing 
for Ethel, and how much she, Orlean, was sacrificing 
for me. 

The contest trial occurred while he was with us, 
and cost, to start with, an attorney's fee of fifty 
dollars, in addition to witnesses' expenses. I had 
bought a house in Megory and we moved it onto 
(Mean's claim. The Reverend helped with the 
moving, but he was so discouraging to have around. 
He dug up all the skeletons I left buried in M — pis 
and bared them to view, in deceitful ways. 

We had decided not to visit Chicago that winter. 
The crop was fair, but prices were low on oats and 
corn, and my crops consisted mostly of those cereals. 
I tried to explain this to the Reverend when he 
talked of what we would have, Christinas, in 
Chicago. 

"Now, don't let that worry you, my boy," he 
would say breezily. "I'll attend to that! I'll 
attend to that!" 

"Attend to what?" I asked. 

"Why, I'll send both of you a ticket." 

"0, really, Reverend, I thank you ever so much, 
but I could not think of accepting it, and you must 
not urge it. We are not coming to Chicago, and I 
wish you would not talk of it so much with Orlean," 
I would almost plead with him. "She is a good 
girl and we are happy together. She wants to help 
17 



258 The Conquest 

me, but she's only a weak woman, and being so far 
away from colored people, she will naturally feel 
lonesome and want to visit home." 

He paid no more attention to me than if I had 
never spoken. In fact, he talked more about 
Chicago than ever, saying a dozen times a day: 

"Yes, children, I'll send you the money." 

I finally became angry and told him I would not, 
under any circumstances whatever, accept such 
charity, and that what my money was invested in, 
represented a value of more than thirty thousand 
dollars, and how could I be expected to condescend 
to accept charity from him. 

He had told me once that he never had as much 
as two hundred dollars at one time in his life. I 
did not want a row, but as far as I was concerned, 
I did not want anything from him, for I felt that he 
would throw it up to me the rest of his life. I was 
convinced that he was a vain creature, out for a 
show, and I fairly despised him for it. 

At last he went home and Orlean and I got down 
to business, moving more of our goods onto the 
claim, and spending about one-third of the time 
there. We intended moving everything as soon 
as the corn was gathered. As Christmas drew near, 
her folks wrote they were looking for her to come 
home, the Reverned having told them that she was 
coming, and that he was going to send her the money 
for her to come. Her mother wrote about it in 
letter, saying she didn't think it was right. Just 
before Christmas, she wrote that maybe if she 
wrote Cousin Sam he would send her the money. 
Cousin Sam was a porter in a down town saloon. 



The Conquest 259 

I felt so mortified that I swore I would never again 
have anything to do with her family. They never 
regarded my feelings nor our relations in the least, 
but wrote a letter every few days about who was com- 
ing to the house to see Orlean Christmas, of who 
was going to have her at their homes for dinner 
when she came home, until the poor girl, with a 
child on the way, was as helpless as a baby, trying 
to be honest with all concerned. It had never been 
her lot to take the defensive. 

My sister came down from her claim and took 
Orlean home with her. While she was in Tipp 
county a letter came fom her father for her, and 
thinking it might be a matter needing immediate 
attention, I opened it and found a money order for 
eighteen dollars, sent from Cairo, with instructions 
when to start, and he would be home to meet her 
when she arrived, suggesting that I could come 
later. 

I was about the maddest man in Megory when 
I was through reading the letter, fairly flying to the 
post office, enclosing the money order and all, with 
a curt little note telling what I had done; that 
Orlean was out on her claim and would be home in 
a few days, but that we were not coming to Chicago. 
I would have liked to tell him that I was running 
my own house, but did not do so. I was hauling 
shelled corn to a feeder in town, when Orlean came. 
She was driving a black horse, hitched to a little 
buggy I had purchased for her, and I met her on 
the road. I got out and kissed her fondly, then told 
what I had done. My love for her had been growing. 
She had been gone a week and I was so glad to see 



260 TheConquest 

her and have her back with me. I took the corn 
on into town and when I returned home she had 
cleaned up the house, prepared a nice supper and 
had killed a chicken for the next day, which was 
Christmas. She then confessed that she had 
written her father that he could send the money. 

"Now, dear," she said, as though a little fright- 
ened, "I'm so sorry, for I know papa's going to 
make a big row." 

And he did, fairly burned the mail with scorching 
letters denouncing my action and threatening what 
he was liable to do about it, which was to come out 
and attend to me. I judged he did not get much 
sympathy, however, for a little while after 
Orlean had written him he cooled down and wrote 
that whatever Orlean and I agreed on was all right 
with him, though I knew nothing of what her letter 
contained. 

The holidays passed without further event, 
excepting a letter from Mrs. Ewis, to my wife, in 
which she said she was glad that she had stayed in 
Dakota and stuck by her husband. The letter 
seemed a little strange, though I thought nothing 
of it at the time. A few months later I was to know 
what it meant, which was more than I could then 
have dreamed of. We were a lone colored couple,, 
in a country miles from any of our kind, honest, 
hopeful and happy; we had no warning, nor if we 
had, would we have believed. Why, indeed, should 
any young couple feel that some person, especially 
one near and dear, should be planning to put 
asunder what God had joined together? 

It was now the last of February and we 



The Conquest 261 

expected our first-born in March. My wife had 
grown exceedingly fretful. Grandma was with us, 
having made proof on her homestead. Orlean kept 
worrying and wanting to go to her claim, talking 
so much about it, that I finally talked with some 
neighbor friends and they advised that it would 
be better to take her to the homestead, for if she 
continued to fret so much over wanting to be there, 
when the child was born, it might be injured in some 
way. When the weather became favorable, I 
wrapped her and grandma up comfortably, and 
sent them to the claim in the spring wagon, while 
I followed with a load of furniture, making the trip 
in a day and a half. We had close neighbors who 
said they would look after her while I went back 
after the stock. A lumber yard was selling out 
in Kirk, and I bought the coal shed, which was strongly 
built, being good for barns and granaries. Cutting 
it into two parts, I loaded one part onto two wagons 
and started the sixty miles to the claim. A thaw 
set in about the time I had the building as far as 
my homestead south of Megory. I decided to leave 
it there and tear down my old buildings and move 
them, instead. I received a letter from Orlean 
saying they were getting along nicely, excepting 
that the stove smoked considerably; and for me 
to be very careful with Red and not let him kick 
me. Red was a mule I had bought the summer 
before and was a holy terror for kicking. 

My sister arrived that night from a visit to 
Kansas, and on hearing from Orlean that she was 
all right, I sent my sister on to her claim, and hiring 
more men, moved the balance of the building onto 



262 The Conquest 

the old farm, tore down the old buildings, loaded 
them onto wagons, and finally got started again for 
Tipp county. That was on Saturday. The wind 
blew a gale, making me feel lonely and far from home. 
Sunday morning I started early out of Colone 
planning to get home that night, but the front axle 
broke and by the time we got another it was growing 
late. We started again and traveled about two 
miles, when the tongue broke, and by the time that 
was mended it was late in the afternoon. About 
six o'clock we pulled into Victor, tired and weary. 
The next day, when about five miles from home, we 
met one of the neighbors, who informed me that he 
had tried to get me over the phone all along the 
way; that my wife had been awfully sick and that 
the baby had been born, dead. It struck me like 
a hammer, and noting my frightened look, he spoke 
up quickly: 

"But she's all right now. She had two doctors 
and didn't lack for attention." 

On the way home I was so nervous that I could 
hardly wait for the horses to get there. I would 
not have been away at this time for anything in the 
world. I knew Orlean would forgive me, but we 
had not told her father. Orlean had told her 
mother and thought she would tell him. He made 
so much ado about everything, we hoped to avoid 
the tire of his burdensome letters, but now, with the 
baby born during my absence, and it dead, when 
we had so many plans for its future. It was to 
have been the first colored child born on the Little 
Crow, and we thought we were going to make his- 
tory. 



TheConquest 263 

When I got to the claim I was weak in every- 
way. My wife seemed none the worse, but my 
emotions were intense when I saw the little dead 
boy. Poor little fellow! As he lay stiff and cold 
I could see the image of myself in his features. My 
wife noticed my look and said : 

"It is just like you, dear!" 

That night we buried the baby on the west side 
of the draw. It should have been on the east, where 
the only trees in the township, four spreading 
willows, cast their shadows. 

"Well, dear, we have each other," I comforted 
her as she cried. 

Between sobs she tried to tell me how she had 
prayed for it to live, and since it had looked so much 
like me, she thought her heart would break. 

When the child was born they had sent a telegram 
to her father which read: 

"Baby born dead. Am well." 

This was his first knowledge of it. We received 
a telegram that night that he was on the way and 
the next day he arrived, bringing Ethel with him. 
When he got out of the livery rig that brought them 
I could see Satan in his face. A chance had come 
to him at last. It seemed to say: 

"Oh, now HI fix you. Away when the child was 
born, eh?" 

His very expression seemed jubilant. He had 
longed for some chance to get me and now it had 
arrived. He did not speak to me, but bounded 
into the room where my wife was, and she must 
have read the same thing in his expression, for, 
as he talked about it later, I learned the first thing 
she said was: 



264 The Conquest 

"Now, papa. You must not abuse Oscar. He 
loves me and is kind and doing the best he can, but 
he is all tied up with debt." 

He would tell this every few hours but I could 
see the evil of his heart in the expression of his eyes, 
leering at me, with hatred and malice in every look. 
He and Ethel turned loose in about an hour. From 
that time on, it was the same as being in the house 
with two human devils. They nearly raised the 
roof with their quarreling. Of the two, the Rever- 
end was the worst, for he was cunning and deceitful, 
pretending in one sentence to love, and in the next 
taking a thrust at my emotions and home. I shall 
never forget his evil eyes. 

Ethel would cry out in her ringing voice: 

"You're practical! You're practical! You and 
your Booker T. Washington ideas!" 

Then she would tear into a string of abusive words. 
One day, after the doctor had been to the house, he 
called me aside and said: 

"Oscar, your wife is physically well enough, but 
is mentally sick. Something should be done so 
that she may be more quiet." 

"Is she quite out of danger?" I asked. 

He replied that she was. That night I told my 
wife of our conversation and the next day I left for 
Megory county. 




The Conquest 265 

CHAPTER XXXVIII 

SANCTIMONIOUS HYPOCRISY 

WAS preparing to seed the biggest crop 
I had ever sown. With Orlean helping 
me, by bringing the dinner to the field 
and doing some chores, during the fall 
we had put the farm into winter wheat and I had 
rentedjthejother Megory county farm. I hired a 
steaming, to break two hundred acres of prairie 
on the Tipp county homesteads, for which I was to 
pay three dollars an acre and haul the coal from 
Colone, a distance of thirty-five miles, the track 
having been laid to that point on the extension west 
from Calias. 

I intended to break one hundred acres with my 
horses and put it into flax. I had figured, that with 
a good crop, it would go a long way toward helping me 
get out of debt. I worked away feverishly, for I 
had gotten deeper into debt by helping my folks 
get the land in Tipp county. 

After putting in fifteen acres of spring wheat, I 
hauled farm machinery to my sister's claim, and 
then began hauling coal from Colone. It was on 
Friday. I was driving two horses and two mules 
abreast, hitched to a wagon loaded with fifty hun- 
dred pounds of coal, and trailing another with thirty 
hundred pounds, when one of the mules got unruly, 
going down a hill, swerved to one side, and in less 
time than it takes to tell it, both wagons had turned 
turtle over a fifteen-foot embankment and I was 
under eight thousand pounds of coal, with both 



266 TheConquest 

wagons upside down and the hind wagonbox splin- 
tered almost to kindling. That I was not hurt 
was due to the fact that the grade had been built 
but a few days previously, had not settled and the 
loose dirt had prevented a crash. I attempted to 
jump when I saw the oncoming disaster, but caught 
my foot in the brake rope which pulled me under 
the loads. 

A day and a half was lost in getting the wreck 
cleared so I could proceed to my sister's claim, from 
where I had intended going home to my wife, fifteen 
miles away. I had left the Reverend in charge 
after he and Ethel had said about all the evil things 
words could express, and he, finding that I was 
inclined to be peaceful, had shown his hatred of me 
in every conceivable manner, until Orlean, who 
could never bear noise or quarreling, decided it 
would be better that I go away and perhaps he 
would quit. I did not get home that trip on account 
of the delay caused by the wreck, but sent my sister 
with a letter, stating that I would come home the 
next trip, and describing the accident. 

I went back to Colone, and while eating supper 
someone told me three colored people were in Colone, 
and one of them was a sick woman. I could hardly 
believe what I heard. My appetite vanished and 
I arose from the table, paid the cashier and left the 
place, going to the hotel around the corner, and there 
sat my wife. I went to her side and whispered : 

" Orlean, what in heaven's name are you doing 
here? And why did you come out in such weather." 

She was still very sick and wheezed when she 
answered, trembling at the same time: 



The Conquest 267 

"You said I could go home until I got well/' 

"Yes, I know/' I answered, controlling my 
excitement. "But to leave home in such weather 
is foolhardy." 

It had been snowing all day and was slippery 
and cold outside. 

"And, besides/' I argued, "you should never 
have left home until I returned. Didn't you get 
my letter?" I inquired, looking at her with a 
puzzled expression. 

"No," she replied, appearing bewildered. "But 
I saw Ollie hand something to papa." 

I then recalled that I had addressed the letter 
to him. 

"But," I went on, "I wrote you a letter last week 
that you should have received not later than Satur- 
day." 

"I — I — I never received it," she answered, and 
seemed frightened. 

I could not understand what had taken place. 
I had left my wife two weeks before, feeling that I 
held her affections, and had thought only of the 
time we'd be settled at last, with her well again. 

The Reverend had said so much about her going 
home that I had consented, but had stipulated that 
I would wait until she was better and would then 
see whether we could afford it or not. 

Suddenly a horrible suspicion struck me with 
such force as almost to stagger me, but calming 
myself, I decided to talk to the elder. He came in 
about that time and looked very peculiar when he 
saw me. 

The town was full of people that night and he had 



268 The Conquest 

some difficulty in getting a room, but had finally- 
succeeded in getting one in a small rooming house, 
and to it we now helped Orlean, who was anything 
but well. 

As we carried her, I could hardly suppress 
the words that came to my lips, to say to him when 
we got into the room, but thought it best not to say 
anything. Ethel, who was sitting there when we 
entered, never deigned to speak to me, but her eyes 
conveyed the enmity within. The Reverend was 
saying many kind words, but I was convinced they 
were all pretense and that he was up to some dirty 
trick. I was further convinced that he not only was 
an arrant hypocrite, but an enemy of humanity as 
well, and utterly heartless. When he and Ethel 
had entered our home three weeks before, neither 
shed a tear nor showed any emotion whatever, and 
had not even referred to the death of the baby, but 
set up a quarrel that never ceased after I went away. 

"Reverend," I said. "Will you and Ethel kindly 
leave the room for a few minutes? I would like 
to speak with Orlean alone." 

They never deigned to move an inch, but finally 
the Reverend said: 

"We'll not leave unless Orlean says so." 

In that moment he appeared the most contemp- 
tible person I ever knew. My wife began crying 
and said she wanted to see her mother, that she 
was sick, and wanted to go home until she got well. 
I was angry all over and turned on the preacher, 
exclaiming hotly: 

"Rev. McCraline, I left you in charge of my wife 
out of respect for you as her father, but," here I 



The Conquest 269 

thundered in a terrible voice, "you have been up to 
some low-lived trick and if I thought you were 
trying to alienate my wife's affections, or had done 
so, I would stop this thing right here and sue you, if 
you were worth anything.'' 

At this he flushed up and answered angrily: 

"I'm worth as much as you." 

He was a poor hand at anything but quarreling, 
but knowing we'd make a scene, I said no more. 
It was a long night, Orlean was restless, and wheezed 
and coughed all through the night. 

I have wondered since why I did not take the 
bull by the horns and settle the matter then, but 
guess it was for the sake of peace, that I've accepted 
the situation and remained quiet. I decided it 
would be best to let her go home without a big row, 
and when she had recovered, she could come home, 
and all would be well. 

My wife had informed me that Claves kept up the 
house, paid for the groceries and half of the install- 
ments, while her father paid for the other half, but 
never bought anything to eat, nor sent any money 
home, only bringing eggs, butter, and chickens 
when he came into the city three or four times a 
year. But Claves' name was not on the contract 
for the home, only her father's name appearing. 
Her father was extremely vain and I had not pleased 
him because I was independent, and he did not like 
independent people. She also told me that her 
father always kept up a row when he was at home, 
but always charged it to everybody else. 

The next morning, just before we started for the 
depot, I said: 



270 The Conquest 

"111 step into the bank and get a check cashed 
and give Orlean some money. I haven't much, but 
I want her to have her own money." 

"Never mind, my son, just never mind. I can 
get along," said the Reverend, keeping his head 
turned and appearing ill at ease, though I thought 
nothing of that at the time. 

"I wouldn't think of such a thing!" I answered, 
protesting that he was not able to pay her way. 
"I wouldn't think of allowing her to accept it." 

"Now! Now! Why do you go on so? Haven't 
I told you I have enough?" he answered in a tenor 
voice, trying to appear winsome. 

Feeling that I knew his disposition, I said no more, 
but as we were passing the bank, I started to enter, 
saying to my wife: 

"I am going to get you some money." 

She caught me by the sleeve and cried excitedly: 
"No! No! No! Don't, because I have money." 
Hesitating a moment and repeating, "I have 
money." 

"You have money?" I repeated, appearing to 
misunderstand her statement. "How did you get 
money?" 

"Had a check cashed," she answered nervously. 

"0, I see!" I said. "How much?" 

"Fifty dollars," she answered, clinging to my 
arm. 

"Good gracious, Orlean!" I exclaimed, near to 
fright. "We haven't got that much in the bank." 

"Oh! Oh! I didn't want to," and then called to her 
father, who was just coming with the baggage: 
"Papa! Papa! You give Oscar back that money. 



The Conquest 271 

He hasn't got it. Oh! Oh! I didn't want to do this, 
but you said it would be all right, and that the 
cashier at the bank, where you got it cashed, called 
up the bank in Calias and said the check was all 
right. Oh! Oh!" she went on, beside herself with 
excitement, and holding her arms out tremblingly 
and repeating: "I didn't want to do this." 

I can see the look in his face to this day. All 
the hypocrisy and pretense vanished, leaving him 
a weak, shame-faced creature, and looking from one 
side to the other stammered out: 

"I didn't do it! I didn't do it! You— You— 
You know, you told her she should write a check for 
any money she needed and she did it, she did it." 

Here again my desire for peace over-ruled my 
good judgment. Instead of stopping the matter 
then and there, I spoke up gravely, saying: 

"I don't mind Orlean's going home. In fact, I 
want her to go home and to have anything to help 
her get well and please her, but I haven't the money 
to spare. Her sickness, with a doctor coming into 
the country twice daily, has been very expensive, 
and. we just have not the money, that is all." 

When he saw I was not going to put a stop to it, 
he took courage and spoke sneakingly: 

"Well, the man in the bank at Carlin called up 
the bank of Calias, and they said the money was 
there." 

"0," I said, "as far as that goes, I had five hun- 
dred dollars there last week, it has all been checked 
out, but some of the checks likely are still out." 

I took twenty-five dollars of the money and gave 
Orlean twenty-five dollars. Her ticket was eighteen 



272 The Conquest 

dollars. I went with them as far as Calias, to see 
how my account stood. I kissed Orlean good-bye 
before leaving the train at Calias, then I went di- 
rectly to the bank and deposited the twenty-five 
dollars. The checks I had given had come in that 
morning, and even after depositing the twenty-five, 
I found my account was still overdrawn thirty 
dollars. 



The Conquest 273 

CHAPTER XXXIX 

BEGINNING OF THE END 



ifr 



WAITED tohearfrom my wife in Chicago 
but at the end of two weeks I had not 
heard from her, although I had written 
three letters, and a week later I jour- 
neyed to Colone and took a train for Chicago. 
When I called at the house the next day her mother 
admitted me, but did not offer to shake hands. 
She informed me Orlean was out, but that it was the 
first time she had been out, as she had been very 
sick since coming home. When I asked her why 
Orlean had not written, she said : 

"I understand you have mistreated my child. " 

" Mistreated Orlean !" I exclaimed. Then, look- 
ing into her eyes, I asked slowly, "Did Orlean tell 
you that?" 

"No," she answered, looking away, "but my 
husband did." 

Gradually, I learned from her, that the Reverend 
had circulated a report that Orlean was at death's 
door when he came to her bedside; if he had not 
arrived when he did, she would have died, and when 
she was well enough to travel, he brought her home. 

It was at last clear to me, as I sat with bowed 
head and feeling bewildered and unable to speak. 
I recalled the words of Miss Ankin eighteen months 
before, "the biggest rascal in the Methodist church." 
I remembered the time I had called and saw him 
driving his wife, who was now sitting before me, 
and the rest of it. I saw all that he had done. He 
18 



274 The Conquest 

had abused this woman for thirty years, and here 
and now, out of spite and personal malice, because 
I had criticized the action of certain members of the 
race, and eulogized the work of Booker T. Washing- 
ton, whom the elder, along with many of the older 
members of the ministry, hated and would not 
allow his name mentioned in his home, I was to lose 
my wife, to pay the penalty. 

He had disliked me from the beginning, but there 
had been no way he could get even. He was " get- 
ting even," spiting me, securing my wife by coercion, 
and now spreading a report thaf I was mistreating 
her, in order to justify his action. 

"Mrs. McCraline, ,, I said, sneaking in a firm 
tone, "Do you believe this?" 

Evading the direct question, she answered : 

"You should never have placed yourself or Orlean 
in such a position." And then I understood. When 
Orlean had written her mother of the coming of the 
child, Mrs. McCraline had not written or told the 
Reverend about it. 

I now understood, further, that she never told 
him anything, and never gave him any information 
if she could avoid it. What my wife had told me 
was proving itself, that is, that they got along with 
her father by avoiding any friction. He could not 
be reasoned with, but I could not believe any man 
would be mean enough to deliberately break up a 
home, and that the home of his daughter, for so 
petty a reason. It became clear to me that he ruled 
by making himself so disagreeable, that everyone 
near gave in to him, to have peace. 

He had only that morning gone to his work. 



The Conquest 275 

On hearing me, Ethel came downstairs and called 
up Claves. A few minutes later her mother called 
me, saying Claves wanted to talk to me. When I 
took the receiver and called "hello," he answered 
like a crazy man. I said: 

"What is the matter? I do not understand what 
you are talking about." 

"What are you doing in my house, after what you 
said about me?" he shouted excitedly. 

"Said about you?" I asked. 

"Yes," he replied, "I hear you treated my wife 
like a dog, after I sent her out there to attend to 
your wife, called me all kinds of bad names, and said 
I was only a fifteen-cent jockey." 

"Treated your wife ugly, and called you a jockey," 
here I came to and said to myself that here was 
some more of the elder's work, but I answered 
Claves: "I haven't the faintest idea of what you 
are talking about. I treated your wife with the 
utmost courtesy while she was in Dakota, I never 
mentioned your name in any such terms as you 
refer to, and I am wholly at a loss to understand 
the condition of affairs I find here. I am confused 
over it all." 

"Well," he answered, "suppose you come down 
to where I work and we will talk it over." 

"I'll do that," I answered, and went down town 
where he worked on Wabash avenue. 

One thing I had noticed about him was, that 
while he was ignorant, he was at least an honest, 
hard-working fellow, but was kept in fear by his 
wife and the elder. I saw after talking to him, that 
he, like Mrs. McCraline, did not believe a word of 



276 The Conquest 

what the Reverend had told about my mistreating 
his daughter, and that he submitted to the elder, 
as the rest of the family did, for the sake of peace. 
But they were all trained and avoided saying any- 
thing about the elder. 

During the conversation with Claves he told me 
he kept up the house, paid all the grocery bills, and 
half the payments. He had been advanced to a 
salary of eighteen dollars a week and seemed to be 
well liked by the management. 

I went to a hotel run by colored people, and at 
about seven-thirty that evening, called up the house 
to see if Orlean had returned. She came to the 
phone but before we had said much, were accident- 
ally cut off. Hearing her voice excited me, and I 
wanted to see her, so hung up the receiver and 
hurried to the house, some ten or twelve blocks 
away. When I rang the bell, Claves came to the 
door. Before he could let me enter, Ethel came 
running down the stairs, screaming as loudly as 
she could : 

"Don't let him in! Don't let him in! You 
know what papa said! Don't you let him in," 
and continued screaming as loud as possible. 

I heard my wife crying in the back room. Claves 
had his hat on and came outside, saying: 

"For God's sake, Ethel, hush up! You'll have 
all the neighborhood out." 

She continued to scream, and to stop her, he 
closed the door. We went together on State street 
and I took a few Scotch highballs and cocktails 
to try to forget it. 

The next day being Sunday, Claves said he would 



The Conquest 277 

try to get Ethel off to church and then I could slip 
in and see Orlean, but she refused to go and when 
I called up, about the time I thought she would be 
gone, she was on guard. My wife was at the phone 
and told me to come over and she would try to slip 
out, but when I called, Ethel had made her go to bed. 
It seemed that she ran the house and all in it, when 
the elder was away. Mrs. McCraline came outside, 
took me by the arm and led me over to Groveland 
park, near the lake. Here she unfolded a plan 
whereby I should find a room nearby, and she would 
slip Orlean over to it, but this proved as unsuccessful 
as the other attempt, to steal a march on Ethel. 
She held the fort and I did not get to see my wife 
but one hour during the four days I was in Chicago. 
That was on Tuesday following, after Claves had 
tried every trick and failed to get Ethel away. This 
time he succeeded by telling her I had left town, 
but when I had been in the house an hour, Ethel 
came and started screaming. I had to get out before 
she would stop. 

The next day I called up and suggested to Orlean 
that I bring a doctor and leave her in his charge 
for I must return to Dakota. She consented and I 
went to a young negro doctor on State street and 
took him to the house, but when we arrived, Ethel 
would not admit us. The doctor and I had roomed 
together before I left Chicago, while he was attending 
the Northwestern Medical School, and we had always 
been good friends. He had been enthusiastic over 
my success in the west and it made me feel dread- 
fully embarrassed when we were refused admittance. 
When I called up the house later Ethel came to the 
phone, and said: 



278 The Conquest 

"How dare you bring a 'nigger doctor' to our 
house? Why, papa has never had a negro doctor 
in his house. Dr. Bryant is our doctor." 

Dr. Bryant, a white doctor, is said to have the 
biggest practice among colored people, of any phy- 
sician. That recalled to my mind some of the 
elder's declarations of a short time before. He had 
said on more than one occasion: 

"I am sacrificing my life for this race," and would 
appear much affected. 

After I returned home, my wife began writing 
nice letters, and so did Claves, who had done all a 
hen-pecked husband could do to help my wife and 
me. He wrote letters from the heart, declaring his 
intention to be more than a friend. He would be 
a brother. I received a letter from him, which 
read: 

Chicago, 111., May 30, 19—. 
Dear Friend Devereaux: 

Your kind and welcome letter was received a few days ago 
and the reason you did not receive my last letter sooner was 
because I left it for Ethel to mail, and she didn't do so. I am 
glad to hear you are getting your flax in good shape, and the 
prospects are fair for a good crop, and now I will tell you about 
Orlean. She seems happier of late than she has been at any 
time since she came home. Now, I don't know how you will 
feel, but I know it relieves my conscience, when I say that your 
wife loves you, and talks of you — to me — all the time. 

Those papers and pamphlets you sent telling all about the 
display Nicholson brothers had on at the Omaha land show. 
She had opened it and when I came home she told me she could 
not wait because she was so anxious to hear about the Little 
Crow. She told me that Nicholson brothers were your best 
friends. I imagine they must be smart fellows for every paper 
in the batch you sent me had something about them in it. 
She took the money you sent her and bought some shoes and 



The Conquest 279 

had some pictures made, so as to send you one. Mrs. Warner 
was over the next day, and said; "Where did you get the 
shoes?" and she answered, "My husband sent them to me." 

Now, I hope you will not worry because she told me as 
soon as she was well enough she was going back to Dakota, 
and as for me, I intend to be more than a friend to you. I'm 
going to be a brother. 

From your dear friend, 

E. M. Claves. 

My wife had written at the same time and used 
many "we" and "ours" in her letter, and I felt 
the trouble would soon be over and she would be 
at home. 

That was the last letter I received from Claves, 
and when I heard from my wife again, it was al- 
together different. Instead of an endearing epistle, 
it was one of accusation, downright abusive. I made 
no complaint, nor did I write to Claves to inquire 
why he had ceased writing. I had always judged 
people by their convictions and in this I knew the 
cause. 




280 The Conquest 

CHAPTER XL 

THE MENNONITES 

lURING the first half of the sixteenth 
century, Menno Simons founded a de- 
nomination of Christians in Friesland, 
a province of the Netherlands. Many 
of these Mennonites settled in Northern Germany. 
This religious belief was opposed to military service 
and about the close of the American Revolution 
the Mennonites began emigrating, until more than 
fifty thousand of their number had found homes 
west of the Dneiper, near the Black Sea, in Southern 
Russia, around Odessa. These people were fa- 
natical in their belief, rejected infant baptism and 
original sin, believing in baptism only on profession 
of faith, and were opposed to theological training. 
In Russia, as in Germany, they led lives of great 
simplicity, both secularly and religiously and lived 
in separate communities. 

The gently rolling lands, with a rich soil, responded 
readily to cultivation, and history proves the Ger- 
mans always to have been good farmers. The 
Mennonites found peace and prosperity in southern 
Russia, until the Crimean war. Being opposed to 
military service, when Russia began levying heavy 
taxes on their lands and heavier toll from their 
families, by taking the strong young men to carry 
on the war, the Mennonites became dissatisfied under 
the Russian government, and left the country in 
great numbers, removing to America, and settling 
along the Jim river in South Dakota. 



The Conquest 281 

Among these settlers was a family by the name of 
Wesinberger, who had grown prosperous, their 
forefathers having gone to Russia among the first, 
although they were not Mennonites. Christopher 
the youngest son, was among those drawn to go to 
the war, but the Wesinbergers were properous, and 
paid the examining physician twelve hundred and 
fifty rubles (about one thousand dollars) to have 
Christopher "made sick" and pronounced unfit 
for service. With the approach of the Russian- 
Japanese War, when it was seen that Russia would 
be forced into war with Japan, the boys having 
married, and with sons of their own, who would 
have to "draw," the Wesinberger brothers sold 
their land and set sail for America. At the time the 
war broke out, John and Jacob were living on home- 
steads, in the county adjoining Tipp county on the 
north, Christopher having settled in western Canada. 

It was while they were breaking prairie near my 
sister's homestead, that I became acquainted with 
the former, who, at that time owned a hundred and 
fifty head of cattle, seventy-five head of horses, 
hogs, and all kinds of farm machinery, besides a 
steam prairie breaking outfit and fifteen hundred 
acres of land between them. 

During rainy days along in April, to pass the time 
away, I would visit them, and while sitting by the 
camp fire was told of what I have written above, but 
where they interested me most was when they dis- 
cussed astronomy and meteorology. They could 
give the most complete description of the zodiacal 
heavens and the different constellations. It seems 
that astronomy had interested their ancestors 



282 TheConquest 

before leaving Germany nearly one hundred and 
thirty years before, and it had been taught to each 
succeeding generation. They seemed to know the 
position of each planet, and on several occasions 
when the nights were clear, with a powerful tele- 
scope, they would try to show them to me, but as I 
knew little or nothing of astronomy, I understood 
but little of their discussions concerning the helio- 
centric longitude of all the planets, or the points 
at which they would appear if seen from the sun. 

Before many months rolled around I had good 
reason to believe at least a part of what they tried 
to explain to me, and that was, that according to 
the planets we were nearing a certain Jupiter dis- 
turbance. 

"And what does that mean?" I asked. 

"That means," they explained, "It will be dry." 

"Jupiter" said John, as he leisurely rolled a 
cigarette, "circumnavigates the sun once while 
the earth goes around it twelve times. In Russia 
Jupiter's position got between the sun and the con- 
stellation Pisces, Aries, Taurus and Gemini, it 
was invariably wet and cool and small grain crops 
were good, but as it passed on and got between the 
sun and the constellations Libra and Scorpio it was 
always followed by a minimum of rainfall and a 
maximum heat, which caused a severe drouth." 

They had hoped it would be different in America, 
but explained further that when they had lived in 
Russia it commenced to get dry around St. Peters- 
burg, Warsaw and all northern Russia a year or so 
before it did in southern Russia. 

They had relatives living around Menno, in 



TheConquest 283 

Hutchinson County, South Dakota, who had wit- 
nessed the disastrous drouth during Cleveland's 
administration. Jupiter was nearing the position 
it had then occupied and would, in sixty days, be 
at the same position it had been at that time. 

While few people pay any attention to weather 
"dopsters," I did a little thinking and remembered 
it had been dry in southern Illinois at that time, and 
I began to feel somewhat uneasy. According to 
their knowledge, if the same in southern America 
as it had been in southern Russia, it would begin 
to get dry about a year before the worst drouth, 
then a very dry year, the third year would begin 
to improve, and after the fourth year conditions 
would again become normal, but the concensus 
of their opinion was there would be a drouth. 




284 The Conquest 

CHAPTER XLI 

THE DROUTH 

CLOUDY and threatening day in May, 
there came an inch of rainfall. I had 
completed sowing two hundred and fifty 
acres of flax a few days before, and soon 
everything looked beautiful and green. I felt 
extremely hopeful. 

During the six years I had been farming in 
Dakota, I had raised from fair to good crops every 
year. The seasons had been favorable, and if a 
good crop had not been raised, it was not the fault 
of the soil or from lack of rainfall. The previous 
year had not been as wet as others, but I had raised 
a fair crop, and at this time had four hundred and 
ten acres in crop and one hundred and ten acres 
rented out, from which I was to receive one third 
of the crop. I had come west with hopes of better- 
ing my financial condition and had succeeded fairly 
well. 

Around me at this time others had grown pros- 
perous, land had advanced until some land adjoining 
Megory had brought one hundred dollars per 
acre, and land a few miles from town sold for fifty 
to eighty dollars per acre. 

Before settling in the west I had read in real 
estate advertisements all about the wheat land that 
could be bought from ten to twenty-five dollars 
per acre, that would raise from twenty-five to forty 
bushels of wheat to the acre. While all this was 
quite possible I had never raised over twenty-five 



The Conquest 285 

bushels per acre, and mostly harvested from ten 
to twenty. I had wondered, before I left Chicago, 
how, at a yield of thirty bushels per acre (and for 
the last seven or eight years prices had ranged from 
seventy cents to one dollar per bushel for wheat) 
the farmers could spend all the money. Of course, 
I had learned, in six years, that twenty-five to forty 
or fifty bushels per acre, while possible, was far from 
probable, and considerably above the average. 

The average yield for all wheat riased in the 
United States is about fourteen bushels per acre, 
but crops had averaged from fair to good all over 
the northwest for some fifteen or sixteen years, with 
some exceptions, and the question I had heard asked 
years before, "Will the drouth come again/ ' was 
about forgotten. 

During the three years previous to this time, poor 
people from the east, and around Megory and Calias 
as well, who were not able to pay the prices de- 
manded for relinquishments and deeded lands in 
Megory, Tipp county, or the eastern states, had 
flocked by thousands to the western part of the 
state and taken free homesteads. At the beginning 
of this, my seventh season in Dakota, the agricul- 
tural report showed an exceedingly large number of 
acres had been seeded, and the same report which 
was issued June eighth, reported the condition of all 
growing crops to be up to the ten-year average and 
some above. 

It was on Sunday. I had quit breaking prairie 
on account of the ground being too dry, and while 
going along the road, I noticed a field of spelt that 
looked peculiar. Going into the field, I dug my 



286 The Conquest 

fingers into the soil, and found it dry. I could not 
understand how it had dried out so quickly; but 
thinking it would rain again in a few days, it had 
been but ten days since the rain, I thought no more 
about it. The following week, although it clouded 
up and appeared very threatening, the clouds passed 
and no rain fell. On Saturday I drove into Ritten, 
and on the way again noticed the peculiar appearance 
of the growing plants. It was the topic of discus- 
sion in the town, but no one seemed willing to admit 
that it was from the lack of moisture. The weather 
had been very hot all week and the wind seemed to 
blow continually from the south. 

In past years, after about two days of south 
winds, we were almost sure to have rain. The fact 
that the wind had blown from the south for nearly 
two weeks and no rain had fallen caused everybody 
to be anxious. That night was cloudy, the thunder 
and lightning lasted for nearly two hours, but when 
I went to the door, I could see the stars, and the 
next day the heat was most intense. 

The Wesinbergers had said the heavens would 
be ablaze with lightning and resound with peals 
of thunder but that they were only solstice storms, 
coming up in unusual directions, and that such 
storms were characteristic of a dry season. Further- 
more, that heavy, abnormal rains would occur in 
scattered localities, at the same time, but they 
would be few and far apart. 

June fifteenth I took my sister to Victor to make 
proof on her homestead, and from there drove to 
Megory, stopping in Calias to send my wife a tele- 
gram to the effect that I felt I was going to be sick 



TheConquest 287 

and for her to draw a draft on the Bank of Calias, 
and come home. The telegram was not answered. 

Next morning my sister left for Kansas, and that 
afternoon a heavy downpour of rain fell all over 
Megory county and as far west as Victor, but north 
of Ritten, where I had my flax crop, there was 
scarcely sufficient rain to lay the dust. On that day 
the hot winds set in and lasted for seven weeks, the 
wind blowing steadily from the south all the while. 

I had never before, during the seven years, 
suffered to any extent from the heat, but during 
that time I could not find a cool place. The wind 
never ceased during the night, but sounded its 
mournful tune without a pause. Then came a 
day when the small grain in Tipp county was beyond 
redemption, and rattled as leaves in November. 
The atmosphere became stifling, and the scent of 
burning plants sickening. 

My flax on the sod, which was too small to be 
hurt at the beginning of the drouth, began to need 
rain, and reports in all daily papers told that the great 
heat wave and the drouth in many places were 
worse than in Tipp county. All over the western 
and northern part of the state, were localities where 
it had not rained that season. Potatoes, wheat, 
oats, flax, and corn, in the western part of the state, 
had not sprouted, and, it was said, in a part of Butte 
county, where seed had been sown four inches deep 
the year before, there had not been enough rain 
since to make it sprout. 

The government had spent several million dollars 
damming the Belle Fourche river for the purpose of 
irrigation, and the previous autumn, when it had 



288 The Conquest 

been completed, the water in it had been run onto 
the land, to see how it would work, and since had 
been dry. No snow had fallen in the mountains 
during the winter, and all the rivers were as dry as 
the roads; while all the way from the gulf, to 
Canada, the now protracted drouth was burning 
everything in its wake. 

At Kansas City, where the treacherous Kaw 
empties its waters into the Missouri, and had for 
years wrought disaster with its notorious floods, 
drowning out two and sometimes three crops in a 
single spring, was nearly dry, and the crops were 
drying up throughout its valley. 

I spent the Fourth of July in Victor, where the 
people shook their heads gravely and said, "Tipp 
county will never raise a crop." The crops had 
dried up in Tipp county the year before. I read 
that the railroad men who run from Kansas City 
to Dodge City reported that the pastures through 
Kansas were so dry along the route, that a louse 
could be seen crawling a half mile away. In parts 
of Iowa the farmers commenced to put their stock 
in pens and fed them hay from about the middle 
of June, there being no feed in the pastures. 
Through eastern Nebraska, western Iowa and south- 
ern Minnesota, the grasshoppers began to appear 
by the millions, and proceeded to head the small 
grain. To save it, the farmers cut and fed it to 
stock, in pens. 

The markets were being over-run with thin cattle 
from the western ranges, where the grass had never 
started on account of lack of moisture. I watched 
my flax crop and early in July noticed it beginning 



The Conquest 289 

to wilt, then millions of army worms began cutting 
it down. On the eleventh I left for Megory 
county, with my stock, to harvest the winter wheat 
there. It had been partially saved by the rain in 
June. The two hundred and eighty-five acres of 
flax was a brown, sickly-looking mess, and I was 
badly discouraged, for outside of my family trouble, 
I had borrowed my limit at the bank, and the flax 
seed, breaking, and other expenses, had amounted 
to eleven hundred dollars. 

About this time the settlers all over the western 
highlands began to desert their claims. Newspapers 
reported Oklahoma burned to a crisp, and Kansas 
scorched, from Kansas City to the Colorado line. 
Homesteaders to the north and west of us begam 
passing through the county, and their appearance 
presented a contrast to that of a few years before.. 
Fine horses that marched bravely to the land of 
promise, drawing a prairie schooner, were returning 
east with heads hanging low from long, stringy 
necks, while their alkalied hoofs beat a slow tattoo, 
as they wearily dragged along, drawing, in many 
cases, a dilapidated wagon over which was stretched 
a tattered tarpaulin; while others drew rickety 
hacks or spring wagons, with dirty bedding and 
filthy looking utensils. These people had not made 
a dollar in the two years spent on their homesteads. 
At Pierre, it was said, seven hundred crossed the 
the Missouri in a single day, headed east; while 
in the settlements they had left, the few remaining 
settlers went from one truck patch to another, 
digging up the potatoes that had been planted in 
the spring, for food. 
19 



290 The Conquest 

One day I crossed the White river and went to 
visit the Wisenbergers, who lived seventeen miles 
to the north. On the way, out of forty-seven 
houses I passed, only one had an occupant. The 
land in that county is underlaid with a hardpan 
about four inches from the surface, and had not 
raised a crop for two years. The settlers had left 
the country to keep from starving. As I drove 
along the dusty road and gazed into the empty 
houses through the front doors that banged to and 
fro with a monotonous tone, from the force of the 
hot south winds, I felt lonely and faraway; the only 
living thing in sight being an occasional dog that 
had not left with his master, or had returned, but 
on seeing me, ran, with tucked tail, like a frightened 
coyote. 

Merchants were being pressed by the wholesale 
houses. The recent years had been prosperous, 
and it is said prosperity breeds contempt and reck- 
lessness. The townspeople and many farmers had 
indulged lavishly in chug-chug cars. Bankers and 
wholesale houses, who had always criticised so much 
automobilism, were now making some wish they had 
never heard the exhaust of a motor. In addition 
to this the speculators were loaded to the guards, 
with lands carrying as heavy mortgage as could 
be had — which was large — for prosperity had caused 
loan companies to increase the amount of their loans. 
No one wanted to buy. Every one wanted to sell. 
The echo of the drouth seventeen years before and 
the disaster which followed, rang through the 
country and had the effect of causing prices to slump 
from five to fifteen dollars per acre less than a year 
before. 



The Conquest 291 

Now what made it worse for Tipp county was, 
that it had been opened when prosperity was at its 
zenith. The people were money mad. Reckless 
from the prosperity which had caused them to dis- 
pense with caution and good judgment, they were 
brought suddenly to a realization of a changed 
condition. The new settlers, all from eastern points, 
came into Tipp county, seeing Tipp county claims 
worth, not six dollars per acre, the price charged by 
the Government, but finding ready sales at prices 
ranging from twenty-five to forty-five dollars, and 
even fifty dollars per acre. They had spent money 
accordingly. Aiid now, when the parched fields 
frowned, and old Jupiter Pluvius refused to speak, 
the community faced a genuine panic. 

Came a day, sultry and stifling with excessive 
heat, when I drove back to the claims. Everywhere 
along the way were visible the effects of the drouth. 
Vegetation had withered, and the trails gave forth 
clouds of dust. 

Late in the afternoon clouds appeared in the north- 
west and the earth trembled with the resounding 
peals of thunder. The lightning played danger- 
ously near, and then, like the artillery of a mighty 
battle, the storm broke loose and the rain fell in 
torrents, filling the draws and ravines, and over- 
flowing the creeks, which ran for days after. All 
over the north country the drouth was broken and 
plant life began anew. 

My wheat threshed about eight hundred bushels, 
and when marketed, the money received was not 
sufficient to pay current expenses. Therefore, I 



292 The Conquest 

could not afford the outlay of another trip to Chi- 
cago, but wrote many letters to Orlean, imploring 
her to return, but all in vain. 

During the summer I had received many letters 
from people in Chicago and southern Illinois, de- 
nouncing the action of the Elder, in preventing my 
wife from returning home. The contents or these 
letters referred to the matter as an infamous out- 
rage, and sympathized with me, by hoping my wife 
would have courage to stand up for the right. I 
rather anticipated, that with so much criticism of 
his action by the people belonging to the churches 
in his circuit, he would relent and let her return 
home; but he remained obstinate, the months 
continued to roll by, and my wife stayed on. 

I had not written her concerning the drouth, 
which had so badly impaired crops. I knew her 
people read all the letters she received, and felt that 
with the knowledge in their possession that my crop 
had been cut short, along with the rest, would not 
help my standing. They would be sure to say to 
her, "I told you so." The last letter that I received 
from my wife, that year, was written early in the 
fall, in answer to a letter that I wrote her, and in 
which I had sent her some money, with which to 
buy some things for my grandmother. When 
Orlean had been in Dakota, she had been very 
fond of my grandmother, and had asked about her 
in every letter, whether the letter was kind or abu- 
sive, as regarded me. My wife's letter, stated that 
she had received the money, and thanked me also 
stated that she would get the things for " Grandma" 
that day. Neither grandmother or I received the 
things. 



The Conquest 293 

I was so wrought up over it all, yet saw no place 
where I could get justice. In order to show the 
Reverend that he was being criticized by friends of 
the family, I gathered up some half dozen or more 
letters, including the last one from Claves and one 
from Mrs. Ewis, and sent them to him. The one 
from Mrs. Ewis related how he had written to her, 
just before he took my wife away, saying that she 
was in dire need, and wanted to borrow twenty- 
five dollars to bring her home. Needless to say, 
she had not sent it, nor assisted him in any other 
way, in helping to break up the home. As a result, 
she said, he had not spoken to her since. 

I learned later that the letters I had sent had 
made him terribly angry. I received a letter from 
him, the contents of which were about the same as 
his conversation had been, excepting, that he did 
not profess any love for me, which at least was a 
relief; but, from the contents, I derived that he had 
expected his act to give him immortality, and 
expressed surprise that he should be criticized for 
coming to Dakota and saving the life of his child — 
as he put it — from the heartless man, that was 
killing her in his efforts to get rich. 

He seemed to forget to mention any of the facts 
which had occurred during his last trip, namely; 
his many declarations of undying love for us; of 
how glad he was that we were doing so much toward 
the development of the great west; and his remarks 
that if he was twenty-five years younger it was 
where he would be. He also suggested that he 
would try to be transferred to the Omaha District, 
so that he might be nearer us. 




294 The Conquest 

CHAPTER XLII 

A YEAR OF COINCIDENCES 

1LTH0UGH the drouth had been broken 
all over the north, it lingered on, to the 
south. My parents wrote me from 
Kansas, that thousands of acres of 
wheat, sown early in the fall, had failed to sprout. 
It had been so dry. The ground was as dry as 
powder, and the winds were blowing the grain out 
of the sandy soil, which was drifting in great piles 
along the fences and in the road. 

The government's final estimated yield of all 
crops was the smallest it had been for ten years. 
As a result, loan companies who had allowed in- 
terest to accumulate for one and two years, in the 
hope that the farmers and other investors would 
be able to sell, such having been the conditions of 
the past, now began to threaten foreclosure and 
money became hard to get. 

From the south came reports that many coun- 
ties in Oklahoma, that were loaded with debt, had 
defaulted for two years on the interest, and County 
warrants, that had always brought a premium, sold 
at a discount. 

The rain that had followed the drouth, in the 
north, as the winter months set in, began to move 
south, and about Christmas came the heaviest 
snows the south had known for years. With the 
snows came low temperatures that lasted for weeks. 
As far south as Oklahoma city, zero weather gripped 
the country, and* to the west the cattle left on 
the ranges froze to death by the thousands. A 



The Conquest 295 

large part of those that lived — few were fit for the 
market, they were so thin — were sold to eastern 
speculators at gift prices, due to the fact that rough 
feed was not to be had. 

The heavy snows that covered the entire country, 
from the Rocky Mountains to the Atlantic, and the 
bitter cold weather that followed, made shipping 
hazardous. Therefore, the rural districts suffered 
in every way. Snow continued to fall and the cold 
weather held forth, until it was to be seen, when 
warm weather arrived, the change would be sudden, 
and floods would result, such was the case. 

It was a year of coincidences; the greatest drouth 
known for years, followed by the coldest winter 
and the heaviest snows, and these in turn by dis- 
astrous floods, will live long in memory. 

To me the days were long, and the nights lonely. 
The late fall rains kept my flax growing until winter 
had set in, and snow fell before it was all harvested. 
All I could see of my crop was little white elevations 
over the field. There was no chance to get it 
threshed. My capital had all been exhausted, and 
it was a dismal prospect indeed. I used to sit there 
in my wife's lonely claim-house, with nothing else 
to occupy my mind but to live over the happy 
events connected with our courtship and marriage, 
and the sad events following her departure. 

During my life on the Little Crow, I had looked 
forward joyfully to the time when I should be a 
husband and father, with a wife to love, and a home 
of my own. This had been so dominant in my mind, 
that when I thought it over, I could not clearly 
realize the present situation. I lived in a sort of 
stupor and my very existence seemed to be a dread- 



296 The Conquest 

ful nightmare. I would at times rouse myself, 
pinch the flesh, and move about, to see if it was my 
real self; and would try to shake off the loneliness 
which completely enveloped me. My head ached 
and my heart was wrung with agony. 

I read a strange story, but its contents seemed so 
true to life. It related the incident of a criminal 
who had made an escape from a prison — not for 
freedom, but to get away for only an hour, that he 
might find a cat, or a dog, or something, that he 
could love. 

It seems he had been an author, and by chance 
came upon a woman — during the time of his escape 
— who permitted him to love her, and during the 
short recess, to her he recited a poem entitled, "The 
right to love." The words of that poem burned 
in my mind. 

"Love is only where is reply, 
I speak, you answer; There am I, 
And that is life everlasting." 

"Love lives, to seek reply. 
I speak, no answer; Then I die, 
To seek reincarnation.'' 

As the cold days and long nights passed slowly 
by, and I cared for the stock and held down my wife's 
claim, the title of that story evolved in my mind, 
and I would repeat it until it seemed to drive me 
near insanity. I sought consolation in hope, and 
the winter days passed at last; but I continued to 
hope until I had grown to feel that when I saw my 
wife and called to her name, she would hear me and 
see the longing in my heart and soul; then would 
come the day of redemption. 




The Conquest 297 

CHAPTER XLIII 

"AND SATAN CAME ALSO." 

|AME a day when the snow had disappeared ; 
my threshing was done; I had money 
again, and to Chicago I journeyed. 
During the winter I had planned a 
way to get to see my wife, and took the first step 
toward carrying it out, immediately following my 
arrival in the city. 

I went to a telephone and called up Mrs. Ewis. 
She recognized my voice and knew what I had come 
for. She said: "I am so glad I was near the phone 
when you called up, because your father-in-law is 
in the house this very minute/ ' On hearing this 
I was taken aback, for it had not occurred to me 
that he might be in the city. As the realization 
that he was, became clear to me, I felt ill at ease, 
and asked how he came to be in the city at that 
time. 

"Well/' and from her tone I could see that she 
was also disturbed — "you see tomorrow is election 
and yesterday was Easter, so he came home to vote, 
and be here Easter, at the same time. Now, let 
me think a moment/' she said nervously. Finally 
she called: ''Oscar, I tell you what I will do, P. H. 
is sick and the Reverend has been here every day 
to see him." Here she paused again, then went on: 
" I will try to get him to go home, but he stays late. 
However, you call up in about an hour, and if he 
is still here, Pll say 'this is the wrong number, see?'" 
"Yes," I said gratefully, and hung up the receiver. 



298 The Conquest 

I had by this time become so nervous that I 
trembled, and then went down into Custom House 
place — I had talked from the Polk Street station — 
and took a couple of drinks to try to get steady. 

In an hour and a half I called up again and it was 
the "wrong number/' so I went out south and called 
on a young railroad man and his wife, by the name 
of Lilis, who were friends of (Mean's and mine. 

After expressing themselves as being puzzled as 
to why the Reverend should want to separate us, 
Mrs. Lilis told me of her. During the conversation 
Mrs. Lilis said: "After you left last year, I went 
over to see Orlean, and spoke at length of you, of 
how broken hearted you appeared to be, and that she 
should be in Dakota. Mrs. McCraline looked uncom- 
fortable and tried to change the subject, but I said 
my mind, and watched Orlean. In the meantime 
I thought she would faint right there, she looked 
so miserable and unhappy. She has grown so fat, 
you know she was always so peaked before you 
married her. Everybody is wondering how her 
father can be so mean, and continue to keep her 
from returning home to you, but Mrs. Ewis can and 
will help you get her because she can do more with 
that family than anyone else. She and the Elder 
have been such close friends for the last fifteen 
years, and she should be able to manage him. 

Then her mother said: "Oscar, I have known 
you all your life; I was raised up with your parents; 
knew all of your uncles; and know your family 
to have always been highly respected; but I can- 
not for my life see, why, if Orlean loves you, she 
lets her father keep her away from you. Now here 



The Conquest 299 

is my Millie/ ' she went on, turning her eyes to her 
daughter, "and Belle too, why, I could no more 
separate them from their husbands than I could 
fly — even if I was mean enough to want to." 

"But why does he do it, Mama? The Reverend 
wants to break up the home of Or lean and Oscar/' 
Mrs. Lilis put in, anxiously. 

"Bless me, my child," her mother replied, "I 
have known N. J. McCraline for thirty years and 
he has been a rascal all the while. I am not 
surprised at anything that he would do." 

"Well," said Mrs. Lilis, with a sigh of resignation, 
"it puzzles me." 

I then told them about calling up Mrs. Ewis and 
what I had planned on doing. It was then about 
nine-thirty. As they had a phone, I called Mrs. 
Ewis again. 

While talking, I had forgotten the signal, and 
remembered it only when I heard Mrs. Ewis calling 
frantically, from the other end of the wire, "This 
is the wrong number, Mister, this is the wrong 
number." With an exclamation, I hung up the 
receiver with a jerk. 

Mrs. Ankin lived about two blocks east, so I 
went to her house from Mrs. Lilis' . On the street, 
the effect of what had passed, began to weaken me. 
I was almost overcome, but finally arrived at Mrs. 
Ankins\ Just before retiring, at eleven o'clock, 
I again called up Mrs. Ewis, and it was still the 
"wrong number." I went to bed and spent a 
restless night. 

I awakened about five-thirty from a troubled 
sleep, jumped up, dressed, then went out and caught 



300 The Conquest 

a car for the west side. I felt sure the Elder would 
go home during the night. 

It is always very slow getting from the south to 
the west side in Chicago, on a surface car, and it 
was after seven o'clock when I arrived at the ad- 
dress, an apartment building, where Mrs. Ewis' 
husband held the position as janitor, and where 
they made their home, in the basement. 

She was just coming from the grocery and greeted 
me with a cheerful "Good Morning, " and "Do you 
know that rascal stayed here until twelve o'clock 
last night/' she laughed. She called him "rascal" 
as a nickname. She took me into their quarters, 
invited me to a chair, sat down, and began to talk 
in a serious tone. "Now Oscar, I understand your 
circumstances thoroughly, and am going to help 
you and Orlean in every way I can. You under- 
stand Rev. McCraline has always been hard-headed, 
and the class of ministers he associates with, are 
more hard-headed still. The Elder has never liked 
you because of your independence, and from the 
fact that you would not let him rule your house and 
submit to his ruling, as Claves does. Now Oscar, 
let me give you some advice. Maybe you are not 
acquainted with the circumstances, for if you had 
been, in the beginning, you might have avoided this 
trouble. What I am telling you is from experience, 
and I know it to be true. Don't ever criticize the 
preachers, to their faces, especially the older ones. 
They know their views and practices, in many in- 
stances, to be out of keeping with good morals, but 
they are not going to welcome any criticism of their 
acts. In fact, they will crucify criticism, and per- 



The Conquest 301 

secute those who have criticized them. Further- 
more, you are fond of Booker T. Washington, and 
his ideas, and Rev. McCraline, like many other 
negro preachers, especially the older ones, hates 
him and everybody that openly approves of his 
ideas. His family admire the educator, and so do 
I, but we don't let on to him. Now I have a plan 
in mind, which I feel a most plausible one, and which 
I believe will work out best for you, Orlean, and 
and myself. Before I mention it, I want to speak 
concerning the incident of last fall. When you sent 
him that bunch of letters, with mine in it, he fairly 
raised cain; as a result, the family quit speaking 
to me, and Orlean has not been over here for six 
months, until she and Ethel came a few days before 
Easter, to get the hats I have always given them. 
Now, she went on, seeming to become excited, if I 
should invite Orlean over, the Elder would come 
along," which I knew to be true. "When you wrote 
me last summer in regard to taking her to a summer 
resort, so you could come and get her, I told Mary 
Arling about it. Now to be candid, Mrs. Arling and 
I are not the best of friends. You know she drinks 
a little too much, and I don't like that, but Mary 
Arling is a friend of yours, and a smart woman." 

"Is that so?" I asked, showing interest, for I 
admired Mrs. Arling and her husband. 

"Yes," Mrs. Ewis reassured me, "she is a friend of 
yours and you know all the McCraline family 
admire the Arlings, and Orlean goes there often." 
"Well, as I was saying", she went on, "last summer 
out at a picnic, Mrs. Arling got tipsy enough to speak 
her mind and she simply laid the family out about 



302 The Conquest 

you. She told the Reverend right to his teeth that 
he was a dirty rascal, and knew it; always had 
been, and that it was a shame before God and man 
the way he was treating you. Yes, she said it," 
she reassured me when I appeared to doubt a little. 
"And she told me she wished you had asked her to 
take Orlean away; that she would not only have 
taken her away from Chicago, but would have 
carried her on back to Dakota where she wanted 
to be, instead of worrying her life away in Chicago, 
in fear of her father's wrath. So now, my plan is 
that you go over to her house, see? You know the 
address/' 

I knew the house. "Well," and she put it 
down on a piece of paper, "you go over there, and she 
will help you; and Oscar, for God's sake, she im- 
plored, with tears in her eyes, do be careful. I 
know Orlean loves you and you do her, but the Rev- 
erend has it in for you, and if he learned you were in 
the city, Orlean would not be allowed to leave the 
house. Now, she added, I will get him over here as 
soon as I can and you do your part. Good-bye." 

I took a roundabout way in getting back to the 
south side, keeping out of the colored neighborhood 
as long as possible, by taking a Halsted street car 
south, got a transfer, and took a Thirty-fifth 
street car. 

I was careful to avoid meeting anyone who might 
know me, but who might not be aware of my pre- 
dicament, and who might thoughtlessly inform the 
McCralines. 

I arrived at Mrs. Arlings without meeting anyone 
who knew me, however. They owned and occupied 



The Conquest 303 

an elaborate flat at an address in the Thirty-seventh 
block on Wabash avenue. I rang the bell, which 
was answered by a young lady unknown to me, but 
who, I surmised, roomed at the house. She inquired 
the name, and when I had told her she let out an " ! " 
and invited me into the parlor. She hurried away 
to tell Mrs. Arling, who came immediately, and 
holding both hands out to me, said, "I am so glad 
you came at last, Oscar, I am so glad." 

After we had said a few words concerning the 
weather, etc., I said in a serious tone, "Mrs. Arling, 
I am being persecuted on account of my ideas." 

"I know it, Oscar, I know it," she repeated, nod- 
ding her head vigorously, and appeared eager. 

I then related briefly the events of the past year, 
including the Reverend's trip to Dakota. 

Raising her arms in a gesture, she said: "If you 
remember the day after you were married, when we 
had the family and you over to dinner, and you and 
Richard (her husband), talked on race matters, that 
the Elder never joined. Well, when you had gone 
Richard said: "Oscar and the Elder are not going 
to be friends long, for their views are too far apart." 
When he brought Orlean home last year I said to 
Richard, 'Rev. McCraline is up to some trick." 
Continuing, she went on to tell me, "You are aware 
how bitter most of the colored preachers are in regard 
to Booker T. Washington." "Yes," I assented. 
"Mrs. Ewis and I talked the matter over and she 
said the Reverend had it in for you from the begin- 
ning, that is, he wanted to crush your theories, and 
have you submissive, like Ethel's husband. He was 
more anxious to have you look up to him because 



304 The Conquest 

you had something; but after he found out you were 
not going to, well, this is the result/' 

"Now, Oscar," whatever you suggest, if it is in my 
power to do so, I will carry it out, because I am sure 
Orlean loves you. She always seems so glad when I 
talk with her about you. She comes over often," 
she went on, "and we get to talking of you." Now 
before I tell you more, you must not feel that she 
does not care for you, because she allows her father 
to keep her away from you. Orlean is just simple, 
babylike and is easy to rule. She gets that from her 
mother, for you know Mary Ann is helpless." I 
nodded, and she continued. "As for the Reverend, 
he has raised them to obey him, and they do, to the 
letter; the family, with Claves thrown in, fear him, 
but as I was going to say: Orlean told me when I 
asked her why she did not go on back to you, 'Well/ 
I don't know/ You know how she drags her speech. 
'Oscar loves me, and we never had a quarrel. In 
fact, there is nothing wrong between us and Oscar 
would do anything to please me. The only thing I 
did not like, was, that Oscar thought more of his 
land and money than he did of me, and I wanted to 
be first/" 

"Isn't that deplorable," I put in, shaking my head 
sadly. 

"Of course it is," she replied with a shrug, "why, 
that could be settled in fifteen minutes, if it were 
not for that old preacher. She always likes to talk 
of you and it seems to do her good." 

"Now, my plan is," I started, with a determined 
expression, "to have you call her up, see?" 

"Yes, yes," she answered anxiously. 




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The Conquest 305 

" And invite her over on pretense of accompanying 
you to a matinee/' 

"Yes, yes," and then, her face seemed to brighten 
with an idea, and she said: "Why not go to a mat- 
inee?" 

"Why yes," I assented. "I had not thought of 
that, then, "Why sure, fine and dandy. We will 
all go, yes, indeed," I replied, with good cheer. 

She went to the phone and called up the number. 
In a few minutes she returned, wearing a jubilant ex- 
pression, and cried: "I've fixed it, she is coming 
over and we will all go to a matinee. Won't it be 
fine?" she continued, jumping up and down, and 
clapping her hands joyfully, beside herself, with en- 
thusiasm, and I joined her. 

Two hours later, Mrs. Hite — the young lady that 
answered the door when I came that morning — called 
from the look-out, where she had been watching 
while Mrs. Arling was dressing, and I, too nervous 
to sit still, was walking to and fro across the room — 
that Orlean was coming. We had been uneasy for 
fear the Elder might hear of my being in the city, 
before Orlean got away. I rushed to the window and 
saw my wife coming leisurely along the walk, entirely 
ignorant of the anxious eyes watching her from the 
second-story window. I could see, at the first glance, 
she had grown fleshy; she had begun before she left 
South Dakota. It was a bay window and we 
watched her until she had come up the steps and 
pulled the bell. 

Mrs. Arling had told me my wife did not have any 
gentleman company. I had not felt she had, for, 
in the first place, she was not that kind of a woman, 
20 



306 The Conquest 

and if her father, by his ways, discouraged any men 
in coming to see her while she was single, he was sure 
to discourage any afterward. But Mrs. Arling had 
added: "I told her I was going to get her a beau, so 
you get behind the door, and when she comes in I 
will tell her that I have found the beau." 

I obeyed, and after a little Orlean walked into the 
room, smiling and catching her breath, from the 
exertion of coming up the steps. I stepped behind 
her and covered her eyes with my hands. Mrs. 
Arling chirped, "That is your beau, so you see I 
have kept my word, and there he is." I withdrew 
my hands and my wife turned and exclaimed "Oh!" 
and sank weakly into a chair. 

We had returned from the theatre, where we wit- 
nessed a character play with a moral, A Romance 
of the Under World. We had tickets for an evening 
performance to see Robert Mantell in Richelieu. 
Mrs. Arling ushered us into her sitting room, closed 
the door, and left us to ourselves. 

I took my wife by the hand; led her to a rocker; 
sat down and drew her down on my knee, and began 
with: "Now, dear, let us talk it over." 

I knew about what to expect, and was not mis- 
taken. She began to tell me of the "wrongs" I 
had done her, and the like. I calculated this would 
last about an hour, then she would begin to relent, 
and she did. After I had listened so patiently 
without interrupting her, but before I felt quite 
satisfied, she wanted to go to the phone and call 
up the house to tell the folks that I was in town. 

"Don't do that, dear," I implored. "I don't 
want them to know, that is, just yet." The reason 



The Conquest 307 

I was uneasy and wanted her to wait awhile was, 
that I felt her father would go to call on Mrs. Ewis 
about eight o'clock and it was now only seven. But 
she seemed restless and ill at ease, and persisted 
that she should call up mother, and let her know, 
so I consented, reluctantly. Then as she was on 
the way to the phone I called her and said: "Now, 
Orlean there are two things a woman cannot be 
at the same time, and that is, a wife to her husband 
and a daughter to her father. She must sacrifice 
one or the other." 

"I know it," she replied, and appeared to be con- 
fused and hesitant, but knowing she would never 
be at ease until she had called up, I said "Go ahead," 
and she did. 

I shall not soon forget the expression on her face, 
then the look of weak appeal that she turned on me, 
when her father's deep voice rang through the phone 
in answer to her "Hello." The next instant she 
appeared to sway and then leaned against the wall 
trembling as she answered, "Oh! Pa-pa, ah," and 
seeming to have no control of her voice. She now 
appeared frightened, while Mrs. Arling and Mrs. 
Hite stood near, holding their breath and looked 
discouraged. She finally managed to get it out, 
but hardly above a whisper, "Oscar is here." 

"Well," he answered, and his voice could be 
heard distinctly by those standing near. "Well," 
he seemed to roar in a commanding way, "Why 
don't you bring him to the house?" 

What passed after that I do not clearly remember, 
but I have read lots of instances of where people 
lost their heads, where, if they would have had 



308 The Conquest 

presence of mind, they might have saved their 
army, won some great victory or done something 
else as notorious, but in this I may be classed as 
one of the unfortunates who simply lost his head. 
That is how it was described later, but speaking 
for myself, when I heard the voice of the man who 
had secured my wife by coercion and kept her away 
from me a year; which had caused me to suffer, 
and turned my existence into a veritable nightmare, 
the things that passed through my mind during the 
few moments thereafter are sad to describe. 

I heard his voice say again, "Why don't you 
bring him to the house?" But I could only seem 
to see her being torn from me, while he, a massive 
brute, stood over lecturing me, for what he termed, 
"my sins," but what were merely the ideas of a 
free American citizen. How could I listen to a 
lecture from a person with his reputation. This 
formed in my mind and added to the increasing 
but suppressed anger. I could see other years 
passing with nothing to remember my wife by, but 
the little songs she had sung so often while we were 
together in Dakota. 

"Roses, roses, roses bring memory of you, dear, 
Roses so sweet and endearing, 
Roses with dew of the morn; 
You were fresh for a day then you faded away. 
Red roses bring memories of you." 

The next moment I had taken the receiver from 
her hand, and called, "Hello, Rev. McCraline," 
"Hello, Rev. McCraline," in a savage tone. When 
he had answered, I continued in a more savage 



The Conquest 309 

voice, "You ask my wife why she did not bring me 
to the house?' ' 

"Yes," he answered. His voice had changed 
from the commanding tone, and now appeared a 
little solicitous. "Yes, why don't you come to 
the house?" I seemed to hear it as an insult. 
I did not seem to understand what he meant, 
although I understood the words clearly. They 
seemed, however, to say; "Come to the house, and 
I will take your wife, and then kick you into the 
street." 

I answered, with anger burning my voice; "I 
don't want to come to your house, because the last 
time I was there, I was kicked out. Do you 
hear? Kicked out." 

"Well, I did not do it." Now, I had looked for 
him to say that very thing. I felt sure that he 
had put Ethel up to the evil doing of a year before, 
and now claimed to know nothing about it, which 
was like him. It made me, already crazed with 
anger, more furious, and I screamed over the phone 
" I know you didn't, and I knew that was what you 
would say, but I know you left orders for it to 
be done." 

"Where is Orlean?" he put in, his voice returning 
to authoritative tone. 

"She is here with me," I yelled, and hung the 
receiver up viciously. 

It was only then I realized that Mrs. Arling and 
Mrs. Hite had hold of each arm and had been 
shouting in my ears all this while," Oscar, Mr. 
Devereaux, Oscar, don't! don't! don't!" and in the 
meantime fear seemed to have set my wife in a state 



310 The Conquest 

of terror. She now turned on me, in tones that did 
not appear natural. The words I cannot, to this 
day, believe, but I had become calm and now plead 
with her, on my knees, and with tears; but her eyes 
saw me not, and her ears seemed deaf to entreaty. 
She raved like a crazy woman and declared she 
hated me. Of a sudden, some one rang the bell 
viciously, and Mrs. Arling commanded me to go up 
the stairs. I retreated against my will. She 
opened the door, and in walked the Reverend. 

Orlean ran to him and fell into his arms and cried: 
"Papa, I do not know what I would do if it were 
not for you/' and kissed him — she had not kissed 
me. After a pause, I went up to him. As I ap- 
proached he turned and looked at me, with a dread- 
ful sneer in his face, which seemed to say, "So I 
have caught you. Tried to steal a march on me, eh?" 
And the eyes, they were the same, the eyes of a pig, 
expressionless. 

Feeling strange, but composed, I advanced to 
where he stood, laid my hands upon his shoulder, 
looked into his face and said slowly, "Rev. 
McCraline, don't take my wife" — paused, then 
went on, "why could you not leave us for a day. 
We were happy, not an hour ago." Here my 
stare must have burned, my look into his face was 
so intense, and he looked away, but without 
emotion. "And now I ask you, for the sake of 
humanity, and in justice to mankind, don't take 
my wife." 

Not answering me, he said to my wife: "Do you 
want your papa?" 

"Yes, yes," she said and leaned on him. Then 



The Conquest 311 

she looked into his face and said: "He insulted 
you/' 

"Yes yes, dear," he answered. "He has done 
that right along, but you step outside and Papa 
will tend to him," 

She still clung to him and said: "He has made 
you suffer." 

He bowed his head, and feigned to suffer. I 
stood looking on mechanically. He repeated, " Run 
outside, dear," and he stood holding, the door open, 
then, realization seemed to come to her, she turned 
and threw herself into Mrs. Arling's arms, weakly, 
and broke into mournful sobs. Her father drew 
her gently from the embrace and with her face in 
her hands, and still sobbing, she passed out. He 
followed and through the open door I caught a 
glimpse of Clavis on the sidewalk below, the man 
who had written — not a year before, "I am going 
to be a brother, and help you." 

The next moment the door closed softly behind 
them. That was the last time I saw my wife. 

THE END 



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